A Bielefeld district to consume electricity intelligently

10.09.2025

Source: E & M powernews

Intelligent and grid-friendly consumption of renewable electricity: Municipal utilities and the university are now testing this together in a district in Bielefeld.

Two research projects are bringing together the utility and the university (HSBI) in Bielefeld, East Westphalia. Stadtwerke and the Institute for Technical Energy Systems (ITES) at HSBI are undertaking a field test in the Sennestadt district to intelligently control the electricity consumption of the future.

The partners are looking for answers to the question of how the flexible electricity feed-in from an increasing number of renewable energy systems and the demand in households with new consumers (e-cars, heat pumps) can be brought together. They have chosen Sennestadt, a district dating back to the 1950s, as a test area.

The first research project, called "ProSeCO - Probabilistic Sector Coupling Optimizer", focuses on monitoring and controlling low-voltage grids. Probability calculations are intended to help predict electricity consumption in households and thus avoid overloads in the grid.

According to the partners, the use of probabilities is necessary because there is still hardly any data available on consumption behavior in households due to the insufficient rollout of smart meters. Municipal utilities, the university and the municipal urban development company Sennestadt GmbH are remedying this situation with a digital twin that can map the networks with only a small amount of existing data.

The twin, in turn, is connected to an energy management system (EMS) that can control electric cars or battery storage systems in a grid-friendly manner and make optimum use of renewable electricity. Based on the information available to the grid operator, specific load profiles can be assigned to individual strings in the grid. The system uses this to calculate how likely peak loads are to occur.

The second project is called "FlexLabQuartier - climate-neutral transformation of neighborhoods" and aims to influence the consumption behavior of people in Sennestadt in terms of the energy transition. The aim is to use locally generated electricity from solar panels directly for charging electric vehicles.

The researchers recognize a fundamental hurdle for the energy transition in the fact that its acceptance also depends on people's economic and social circumstances. They want to keep the recommendation on when it is best to charge a car, for example, "understandable and accessible". The lever is an app that displays charging times at the times with the most solar power.

Municipal utilities and the university have been fostering an exchange between science and practice for more than ten years. They consider the collaboration to be valuable because it promotes the transfer of research results and practical innovations. On the other hand, this results in intelligent, efficient and sustainable solutions for the energy supply.

Author: Volker Stephan