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Energy Storage-Driven Virtual Power Plants: Key Enablers, Operations, and Policy...
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Energy Storage-Driven Virtual Power Plants: Key Enablers, Operations, and Policy Landscapes in Future Power Systems

A Special Issue of Automation (ISSN 2673-4052) belonging to the section "Automation in Energy Systems".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 20 September 2026 | Viewed by 1836

Editors

Dr. Mingze Zhang

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Harbin University of Science and Technology, Harbin 150080, China
Interests: automation in power system; energy storage; planning and dispatching
Dr. Samson Yu

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
School of Engineering, Deakin University, Geelong, VIC 3216, Australia
Interests: nonlinear systems; optimization; control theories and applications; sustainable transportation and electricity
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Prof. Dr. Yang Li

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
School of Electrical Engineering, Northeast Electric Power University, Jilin City 132012, China
Interests: wind and solar dispatch; uncertainty modeling and analysis; energy storage/EV integration; optimization of integrated energy systems; integrated demand response; AI-driven power system analysis; federated learning
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Chao Long

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Electrical Engineering and Electronics, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, UK
Interests: machine learning for energy systems; flexibility service provision; community energy system optimization; peer-to-peer energy trading; energy system resilience
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. Saman A. Gorji

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Centre for Smart Power & Energy Research, School of Engineering, Deakin University, Waurn Ponds, VIC 3216, Australia
Interests: power electronics; renewable energy; systems; green hydrogen; microgrid; DC-DC converters

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

The massive uptake of renewable energy sources helps reduce carbon emissions. However, with the continuous increase in the penetration rate of new energy resources, conventional units, as the main flexibility regulation resources in power grids, are gradually being phased out, resulting in an inability to guarantee secure operations and market functionality in power systems. Flexible regulatory resources, including energy storage and virtual power plants, can play an important role in power grid operations, helping ensure secure, cost-effective, and sustainable power system operations. This Special Issue aims to attract original research for key technologies related to the participation of flexible resources, such as energy storage and virtual power plants, in the operations and regulation of power systems, as well as novel energy market policies and commercial mechanisms, to promote the full utilization of flexible regulation resources and solve theoretical and practical problems for flexible resources in power systems.

This Special Issue welcomes original research on the topics, which include but are not limited to the following areas:

  • Planning, dispatch, and control for flexible resources participating in power system operations.
  • Business models and trading mechanisms of flexible resources in power systems.
  • Aggregation, trading, and control strategies for distributed flexible resources.
  • Collaborative control of the main-distribution network to support the flexible role of distributed resources.
  • Analysis and optimization of control mechanisms for frequency security and stability in power systems.
  • Classification and design of load forecasting application scenarios under the influence of multiple factors.
  • Coordination optimization and control of multiple resources, including conventional power sources, emerging renewable energy sources, and flexible resources.

Dr. Mingze Zhang
Prof. Dr. Yang Li
Dr. Samson Yu
Dr. Chao Long
Dr. Saman A. Gorji
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 250 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for assessment.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-anonymized peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Automation is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1200 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • planning, dispatch, and control for flexible resources participating in power system operations. business models and trading mechanisms of flexible resources in power systems
  • aggregation, trading, and control strategies for distributed flexible resources. collaborative control of the main-distribution network to support the flexible role of distributed resources
  • analysis and optimization of control mechanisms for frequency security and stability in power systems
  • classification and design of load forecasting application scenarios under the influence of multiple factors
  • coordination optimization and control of multiple resources, including conventional power sources, emerging renewable energy sources, and flexible resources

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Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

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32 pages, 2177 KB  
Article
A Techno-Economic Analysis Using DERs on Apartments as Virtual Power Plants Based on Cooperative Game Theory
by Janak Nambiar, Samson Yu, Ian Lilley and Hieu Trinh
Automation 2026, 7(3), 67; https://doi.org/10.3390/automation7030067 - 28 Apr 2026
Viewed by 847
Abstract
This study presents a techno-economic analysis of deploying distributed energy resources (DERs), specifically photovoltaic (PV), battery energy storage systems (BESSs) and electric vehicles (EVs), in apartment buildings configured as Virtual Power Plants (VPPs). Utilizing cooperative game theory, the research models strategic collaboration between [...] Read more.
This study presents a techno-economic analysis of deploying distributed energy resources (DERs), specifically photovoltaic (PV), battery energy storage systems (BESSs) and electric vehicles (EVs), in apartment buildings configured as Virtual Power Plants (VPPs). Utilizing cooperative game theory, the research models strategic collaboration between apartment residents (demand side) and utility operators (plant side) to maximize energy efficiency and economic returns. The VPP structure is analyzed over a 15-year life cycle, incorporating net present value (NPV), payback period (PBP), and government subsidy impacts. A cooperative game framework is applied using the Shapley value to ensure fair profit allocation based on each party’s contribution. Results indicate improved self-sufficiency, peak load reduction, and mutual financial benefits. Scenario analyses show that government subsidies to the plant side significantly increase the likelihood of successful cooperation, while declining DER costs enhance the VPP’s economic viability. The findings demonstrate that apartments configured as VPPs achieve strong economic viability (39% ROI, 10.5-year payback) and operational performance (70% self-sufficiency, 40% peak reduction) when grid arbitrage is enabled and moderate government subsidies (35% PV, 45% BESS) are provided. This research provides a replicable model for urban energy planning and policy development, promoting sustainable energy transitions through shared DER infrastructure and cooperative stakeholder engagement. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Energy Storage-Driven Virtual Power Plants: Key Enablers, Operations, and Policy Landscapes in Future Power Systems)
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Review

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39 pages, 1921 KB  
Review
Towards Agentic Virtual Power Plants for Grid-Interactive Energy Communities: A Review-Informed Reference Architecture for Operational Flexibility Intelligence
by Bo Nørregaard Jørgensen and Zheng Grace Ma
Automation 2026, 7(5), 138; https://doi.org/10.3390/automation7050138 - 3 Sep 2026
Viewed by 312
Abstract
The growing deployment of distributed renewable generation, storage, electric vehicles, heat pumps, smart buildings, and controllable demand is expanding the flexibility available to local energy systems. Energy communities provide the governance context for collective participation and value creation, while community virtual power plants [...] Read more.
The growing deployment of distributed renewable generation, storage, electric vehicles, heat pumps, smart buildings, and controllable demand is expanding the flexibility available to local energy systems. Energy communities provide the governance context for collective participation and value creation, while community virtual power plants provide the operational mechanism for aggregating distributed resources and connecting them to local optimisation, flexibility markets, grid services, and resilience functions. This PRISMA-ScR-informed framework development study synthesises the literature from Scopus, Web of Science, and IEEE Xplore to examine how artificial intelligence supports community VPP operation, where agentic AI adds capabilities beyond established optimisation, reinforcement learning, and multi-agent systems, and which design requirements follow governed orchestration. The synthesis shows that current evidence is strongest for component-level forecasting, scheduling, bidding, adaptive control, distributed coordination, and digital-twin validation, whereas integrated agentic orchestration remains an emerging direction. Classical multi-agent systems already provide decentralised representation, communication, negotiation, and coordinated control; the additional role proposed for agentic AI is therefore narrower and concerns context-aware multi-step workflow orchestration, governed tool use, exception handling, grounded explanation, and bounded delegation across existing analytical and control services. The study introduces operational flexibility intelligence as the capability to transform potential distributed flexibility into deployable, authorised, market-, grid-, resilience-, and community-compatible action. It further develops a conceptual layered reference architecture in which agentic orchestration operates through governed tools and interfaces rather than bypassing validated resource controllers. Fairness, comfort, privacy, cybersecurity, resilience, auditability, and human-in-command authority are treated as cross-cutting operational constraints. The architecture defines a design and validation agenda rather than an empirically validated implementation. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Energy Storage-Driven Virtual Power Plants: Key Enablers, Operations, and Policy Landscapes in Future Power Systems)
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