Value of short-term heating system flexibility – A case study for residential heat pumps on the German intraday market

In the discussion of power market flexibilisation, the electrification of residential heating systems is increasingly gaining attention. Heat pumps are well suited to provide short-term flexibility, especially if combined with thermal storage which allows to shift loads towards times with low prices and high renewable feed-in. They are therefore promising in providing additional value to market actors through their flexibility. To analyze the short-term value residential heating systems provide, we develop an equivalent electric storage model simulating arbitraging on the intraday market while describing all processes in electrical terms. The model is applied to evaluate the value of flexibility provided by heat pumps with thermal storage on the German intraday market. Representative building types and configurations are assessed. The base case results show that potential yearly profits per building for 2018 range from 17€ to 85€ for single-family houses, from 52€ to 275€ for multi-family houses and from 123€ to 692€ for large multi-family houses. The most relevant factors are found to be the exploitation, the level of price spreads, and the available shiftable load with the latter being higher for more inefficient and larger buildings.