Impact of coupling thermal and electrical carriers on the optimal management of a multi-energy network

Multi-energy networks are becoming a leading research subject in the last years, particularly, with the accelerating emergence of renewable resources into the energetic system. Decoupling this problem into several single-vector networks results in a sub-optimal solution. However, this approach comes up against a great technological complexity, from the design of each of the components necessary for such a hybrid network to their modeling and the global management of the whole. In this work, we propose coupled electrical and thermal networks, with an energy hub integrating electrochemical and thermal storage systems, and conversion systems: Heat To Power and Power To Heat. To achieve this, a modeling of the different physical subsystems and a management of the whole system using Model Predictive Control (MPC) are investigated. Finally, a comparison of the two configurations without and with coupling is conducted to evaluate the impact of such a multi-energy network.