Customer demand side response demonstrated in Hungary

Independent aggregator Energo Hungary has conducted the country’s first flexibility demonstration in a Budapest building.

The project in partnership with building climatisation specialist Daikin Hungary was carried out at property group CPI’s new Balance Hall building in Budapest’s XIII district in the north of the city.

The new office building was developed as a sustainable space, with a range of energy saving and management features. These include building energy management and air quality monitoring systems as well as water saving solutions.

The pilot tested the role of Daiken’s VRV heat pump technology in delivering flexibility, with Energo Hungary integrating its technology to the building energy control system.

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Tests demonstrated a temporary reduction of over 90% in the VRV system’s power consumption – greater than had been anticipated by the participants – with both the speed and scale of the response suitable to provide flexibility to the grid.

“A successful pilot gives us a new approach to solving our challenges,” commented Tamás Ercsey, head of Business Development at Energo Hungary.

“The heat storage capacities of buildings are the ‘batteries’ of the sustainable network of the future. Consumers can become active players in balancing the network without additional investment and receive a new revenue.”

Like elsewhere in Europe, new regulations in Hungary over the past year have opened the way for the new players such as aggregators in the balancing markets and for small scale consumers to become active participants.

Balázs Zuggó, Managing Director of Daikin Hungary, adds: “There are great reserves and opportunities in Daikin’s entire product portfolio, which we are happy to partner on now and in the future.”

Heat pumps are anticipated to play a key role in decarbonising heating and their use is being encouraged. In the UK for example, they are being incentivised with a reduced VAT of 5% instead of the standard 20%.

Tests of their role in delivering flexibility also have been conducted elsewhere with positive results.