Optimized Energy Management in Grid-Connected Renewable ‎Energy Hubs Incorporating Thermal, Compressed Air, and Hydrogen ‎Storage Systems with Heat Pumps

Akbari, Ehsan; Pirouzi, Sasan

doi:10.61882/jgeri.3.1.31

Optimized Energy Management in Grid-Connected Renewable ‎Energy Hubs Incorporating Thermal, Compressed Air, and Hydrogen ‎Storage Systems with Heat Pumps

Document Type : Research article

Authors

Ehsan Akbari ¹

Sasan Pirouzi ²

¹ Department of Electrical Engineering, Mazandaran University of Science and Technology, Babol, Iran

² Department of Engineering, Sem.C., Islamic Azad University, Semmirom, Iran

10.61882/jgeri.3.1.31

Abstract

This study explores the effective energy management strategies employed by ‎electricity and heat grids hubs, emphasizing multi-criteria objectives that balance ‎economic performance and operational efficiency for network operators. The ‎primary objective of this study is to optimize the integration of multiple renewable ‎energy sources, namely solar energy, bio-waste units, and wind turbines, within a ‎unified management framework. The system employs advanced energy storage ‎technologies, including compressed air, thermal, and hydrogen storage units. ‎Thermal energy production is achieved through electrically powered heat pumps, ‎while combined heat and power (CHP) systems are utilized to enhance the ‎performance of both bio-waste and hydrogen storage subsystems. The proposed ‎approach seeks to optimize energy procurement costs across these networks, ‎aligning with their operational models. A key challenge tackled involves ‎efficiently managing the interdependencies of energy sources and storage systems ‎within the conceptual framework of an energy hub. By addressing these ‎complexities, the strategy demonstrates measurable improvements in both ‎technical and financial outcomes for electricity and heat grids. The numerical ‎analysis highlights the efficacy of the proposed approach, demonstrating ‎significant improvements in both economic viability and operational efficiency. ‎Specifically, the integration of renewable energy hubs, storage, and heat pump ‎systems, has achieved an approximate 44.1% enhancement in economic conditions ‎and operational improvements ranging from 28% to 90%. These gains signify a ‎clear advantage over traditional load flow methodologies, reaffirming the potential ‎of advanced hub energy management in modern networks.‎

Graphical Abstract

Optimized Energy Management in Grid-Connected Renewable ‎Energy Hubs Incorporating Thermal, Compressed Air, and Hydrogen ‎Storage Systems with Heat Pumps

Highlights

❖ The study optimizes a unified energy hub framework integrating solar, wind, and biowaste sources with compressed air, thermal, and hydrogen storage.
❖ Advanced management of interdependencies between heat pumps, CHP systems, and storage units reduced energy procurement costs by approximately 44.1%.
❖ Operational efficiency improvements ranged from 28% to 90%, significantly outperforming traditional load flow methodologies.
❖ The proposed multi-criteria strategy successfully balances economic performance and technical reliability for modern electricity and heat grid operators

Keywords

Energy hub management

Compressed air energy storage

Hydrogen storage

Thermal energy storage

Multi-energy systems optimization

Declaration of Competing Interest

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper. The ethical issues, including plagiarism, informed consent, misconduct, data fabrication and/or falsification, double publication and/or submission, redundancy, have been completely observed by the authors.

Credit Authorship Contribution Statement

Ehsan Akbari: Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, Investigation, Methodology, Project administration, Resources, Software, Supervision, Validation, Visualization, Roles/Writing - original draft, Writing-review & editing. Sasan Pirouzi: Conceptualization, Data curation, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, Investigation, Methodology, Project administration, Resources, Software, Supervision, Validation, Visualization, Roles/Writing - original draft, Writing-review & editing. Abdolreza Behvandi: Data curation, Formal analysis, Investigation, Resources, Validation.

Bibliography

Ehsan Akbari received the B.Sc. degree in Electrical Power Engineering from Mazandaran University, Babolsar, Iran, in 2009 and M.S. degree in Electrical Power Engineering from Mazandaran University of Science and Technology, Babol, Iran, in 2014. He received Ph.D. in Electrical Power Engineering from Isfahan University of Technology, Isfahan, Iran in 2022. He is now a Assistant Professor at Department of Electrical Engineering, Mazandaran University of Science and Technology, Babol, Iran. He is the author of 25 books and more than 355 papers in reputed journals and conferences and won six patents in his research fields. He has obtained five provincial scientific and technological progress awards. His main areas of research are power quality, flexible AC transmission systems (FACTS), application of power electronics in power systems, power electronics multilevel converters, smart grids, control of grid-connected converters, fault location, distributed generation, energy storage systems, micro-grids, voltage stability, electrical machines, special electrical machinery, HVDC systems, harmonics, reactive power control using hybrid filters and renewable energy systems.

Sasan Pirouzi received the B.Sc. degree in electrical engineering from Technical and Vocational University, Mashhad, Iran, in 2012, the M.Sc. degree from the Isfahan University of Technology, Isfahan, Iran, in 2014, and the Ph.D. degree from the Shiraz University of Technology (SUTECH), Shiraz, Iran, in 2017. His research interests include power system operation and planning, electric vehicles, DERs, and the application of optimization methods in power systems.

Abdolreza Behvand was born in 1987 in Iran. He received his B.Sc., M.Sc., and Ph.D. degrees all in Electrical Engineering (Power Systems) in 2010, 2012, and 2019 from Isfahan University of Technology, Isfahan University, and Shahid Chamran University of Ahvaz, respectively. Currently, he is an Assistant Professor at Department of Electrical Engineering, Ramhormoz Branch, Islamic Azad University, Ramhormoz, Iran. His special interests are power system studies, power system protection, renewable energy, and microgrids.

Citation

E. Akbari, S. Pirouzi, and A. Behvandi, "Energy Management of Grid-Connected Renewable Energy Hubs with Thermal, Compressed Air and Hydrogen Storages and Heat Pump," Journal of Green Energy Research and Innovation, vol. 3, no. 1, pp. 31-41, 2026.