Special Session 18
Efficient Aggregation, Accurate Modeling, and Coordinated Operation of Demand-Side Flexibility Resources under Market Mechanisms
As China’s electricity market reform continues to advance, an increasingly diverse set of demand-side participants—such as electric vehicles, virtual power plants, and industrial loads—are becoming active players in market-based transactions. Unlocking and mobilizing latent flexibility on the demand side can not only enhance market structure and improve the efficiency of resource allocation, but also strengthen the secure, reliable operation and low-carbon transition of emerging power systems.Nevertheless, demand-side flexibility resources are typically highly distributed, heterogeneous, and characterized by complex, often nonlinear dynamics. These features bring significant challenges to their large-scale integration into market environments. In particular, how to aggregate such resources effectively, model their technical and economic behaviors with sufficient accuracy, and design appropriate mechanisms to guide and regulate their market participation has become a shared focus for both academia and industry.
This special session will provide a forum to discuss state-of-the-art methods and practical experiences in the aggregation, modeling, and coordinated operation of demand-side flexibility under market conditions. We will further explore how theoretical advances, enabling technologies, and supportive policy frameworks can jointly enhance flexible demand regulation and unlock the full market value of demand-side resources.
Chairs:
Dr. Hongxu Huang, Tsinghua University, China
Hongxu Huang received the B.Eng. and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from China University of Mining and Technology, China, in 2019 and 2024, respectively. From 2021 to 2022, he was a Visiting Ph.D. Student at Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. Since July 2024, he has been a Research Fellow with the Department of Electrical Engineering, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China. His research interests include power system operations, electricity markets, industrial virtual power plants, and optimization techniques.
Assoc. Prof. Jiaqi Ruan, Sichuan University, China
Jiaqi Ruan is an Associate Professor in the College of Electrical Engineering at Sichuan University, Chengdu, China. His research interests include smart grids, artificial intelligence algorithms and applications, cyber-physical security, climate risk, and vulnerability analysis. He has published over 40 SCI/EI indexed papers, including work in Nature Reviews Electrical Engineering and The Innovation, and one of his papers was featured as a popular paper in IEEE Transactions on Smart Grid. He has led several research projects, including a National Natural Science Foundation of China. He has chaired several panel and special sessions and has been an invited speaker at multiple international conferences. He also serves on the Youth Editorial Board of Protection and Control of Modern Power Systems and Energy Conversion and Economics.
Assoc. Prof. Pupu Chao, Dalian University of Technology, China
Dr. Pupu Chao is an Associate Professor and Ph.D. Supervisor at Dalian University of Technology. Her research focuses on renewable power generation and grid integration technologies, as well as ultra-high-voltage direct current (UHVDC) and flexible DC transmission technologies. Dr. Chao has led two subtasks of the National Key R&D Program of China, two National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) projects, and more than ten projects from the State Grid Corporation of China (SGCC), and has participated in eight national-level projects. She has published over 20 SCI/EI-indexed papers and holds more than 20 granted invention patents. Dr. Chao has received several honors and awards, including a Prize of Provincial Science and Technology Award, the IEEE PES Outstanding Female Technologist Award, the Outstanding Paper Award from the Chinese Society for Electrical Engineering, and she was selected for the Young Talent Project of the Chinese Society for Electrical Engineering.
Assist. Prof. Yang Yang, University of Macau, China
Yang Yang is an Assistant Professor at the State Key Laboratory of Internet of Things for Smart City, University of Macau. He has published more than ten academic papers in top international journals such as Nature Energy (5-year impact factor: 68.9), Nature Communications, and IEEE Transactions on Power Systems, including one ESI Highly Cited Paper. He holds one granted patent and two registered software copyrights. He has received several prestigious awards, including the Best Student Paper Award at the International Conference on System Reliability and Safety (SRSE 2021), the Outstanding Reviewer Award from IEEE Transactions on Power Systems (2023), etc. His research interests include power system operation and optimization, frequency security of power systems, and socio-technical coupled systems.
Dr. Licheng Wang, The University of Queensland, Australia
Licheng Wang received the B. Eng., M. Eng and Ph.D. degrees from Huazhong University of Science and Technology (HUST), Wuhan, China, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China, and the University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia, respectively. He was an Associate Professor in College of Information Engineering, Zhejiang University of Technology, Hangzhou, China, and now he is a research fellow (Level B) in the University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia. His research interests include power system operation and control, renewable energy integration into distribution systems, grid forming/grid following converter control design, deep reinforcement learning and its application in networked systems.