Time-series aggregation for synthesis of distributed energy supply systems by bounding error in operational expenditure

For synthesis of distributed energy supply systems, the complexity of the mathematical optimization problem is commonly reduced by time-series aggregation. Today, the accuracy of the aggregation is measured in the time-series domain, i.e., by the capability of the aggregated time-series to represent the original time-series. In this paper, we propose a method for time-series aggregation measuring the accuracy of the aggregation in the domain of the objective function: The error is evaluated between the operational expenditure resulting from calculations using the aggregated time-series and the original time-series. An adaptive procedure selects representative time-steps for the aggregated time-series. It is shown that aggregation to few time-steps is sufficient to represent the original time-series with excellent accuracy in operational expenditure.