CityLearn v2: energy-flexible, resilient, occupant-centric, and carbon-aware management of grid-interactive communities
Kingsley Nweye, Kathryn Kaspar, Giacomo Buscemi, Tiago Fonseca, Giuseppe Pinto, Dipanjan Ghose, Satvik Duddukuru, Pavani Pratapa, Han Li, Javad Mohammadi, Luís Lino Ferreira, Tianzhen Hong, Mohamed Ouf, Alfonso Capozzoli, Zoltán Nagy
Abstract
As more distributed energy resources become part of the demand-side infrastructure, quantifying their energy flexibility on a community scale is crucial. CityLearn v1 provided an environment for benchmarking control algorithms. However, there is no standardized environment utilizing realistic building-stock datasets for distributed energy resource control benchmarking without co-simulation or third-party frameworks. CityLearn v2 extends CityLearn v1 by providing a stand-alone simulation environment that leverages the End-Use Load Profiles for the U.S. Building Stock dataset to create grid-interactive communities for resilient, multi-agent, and objective control of distributed energy resources with dynamic occupant feedback. While the v1 environment used pre-simulated building thermal loads, the v2 environment uses data-driven thermal dynamics and eliminates the need for co-simulation with building energy performance software. This work details the v2 environment and provides application examples that use reinforcement learning control to manage battery energy storage system, vehicle-to-grid control, and thermal comfort during heat pump power modulation.