Cloud Computing Based Demand Response Management Using Deep Reinforcement Learning

Demand response is an effective way for ensuring safety and stabilization of power grid by maintaining the balance between the supply and the demand of power grid, and this paper focuses on using electric water heaters for demand response. In addition to considering comfort and price factors as did in previous works, this paper considers the overshoot temperature and its influence on demand response. First, a theoretical model of the heating and cooling processes of the electric water heater is established; second, the demand response process using electric water heaters is analyzed, including the influences of the physical parameters and the settings of electric water heaters on the demand response process; third, a model is established considering the demand response requirement, the comfort of owners of electric water heaters, and the electricity price, simultaneously; fourth, an optimization method based on deep reinforcement learning is proposed for demand response using electric water heaters. Meanwhile, the influence of parameters on the results of demand response is discussed in details. Experimental results show the effectiveness of the proposed method.