Customer Load Strategies for Demand Response in Bilateral Contracting of Electricity

Electricity markets are systems for affecting the purchase and sale of electricity using supply and demand to set energy prices. Electricity can be traded in organized markets or by negotiating forward bilateral contracts. Demand response (DR) refers to participation by customers in electricity markets, seeing and responding to prices as they change over time. Customers may adopt several basic load response strategies, notably foregoing electricity usage at times of high prices without making it up later, and shifting or rescheduling usage away from times of high prices to other times. This article describes on-going work that uses the potential of agent-based technology to develop a computational tool for supporting bilateral contracting in electricity markets with demand response. From the perspective of enduse customers, it investigates how foregoing and shifting affect the energy and monetary outcomes of consumers applying DR during bilateral contracting.