The Greenpower house: From simulation to reality

Abstract

The Greenpower concept addresses the steadily increasing electric consumption by optimizing the energy fluxes in a modern house. The latter can be equipped with photovoltaic panels, an electrolyzer system (hydrogen generator and storage), a battery, a hybrid car (fuel cell powered) and a control station. In order to develop and validate the concept under various circumstances, a convenient simulation model was developed under Matlab/Simulink. In parallel, a family house was equipped with the needed equipment in order to test the concept in real conditions. This article is organized in four chapters. First, the introduction contextualizes the system and describes the main building blocks. Second, the simulation environment is presented, emphasis is put on its simplicity and modularity. Third, the actual test site is described and results are presented. Finally, a conclusion summarizes the achieved work.