Local Energy Market-Consumer Digital Twin Coordination for Optimal Energy Price Discovery under Thermal Comfort Constraints
, Christos Mountzouris 1, John Gialelis 1, Alexios Birbas 1, Stylianos Karatzas 2 and Alex Papalexopoulos 3
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
The paper “applsci-2165004” presents an interesting study that investigates the problems of the opportunity provided by Local Energy Markets (LEM) to be a catalyst by offering a digital platform optimizing the grid interaction by satisfying the prosumers’ energy needs and offerings locally. The paper is well done. I recommend making some minor revisions.
1. The most important quantitative results of the paper should be added to the abstract.
2. The authors should avoid lumping references. Instead, summarize the main contribution of each referenced paper in a separate sentence.
3. Literature review should be improved. The authors should conclude the limitations of the previously published paper and clearly describe the knowledge gap.
4. The reviewer suggests that the contributions and the paper organization should be located at the end of the state-of-the-art section since the contribution is an addressing of the knowledge gap concluded from the conducted review of the published works.
5. In the mathematical foundation, that seems insufficient and requires more investigation, the involved parameters in an equation should be explained at its end before the following equation.
6. The conclusions should be summarized in bullet points.
Author Response
Thank you for taking the time to review our paper. We appreciate your valuable comments and feedback. Necessary revisions and changes to the manuscript have been made as per your suggestions.
Reviewer 1 - Comment 1: The most important quantitative results of the paper should be added to the abstract.
Answer: Thank you for the remark. The paper’s abstract has been updated to include the most important quantitative paper’s results.
Reviewer 1 - Comment 2
The authors should avoid lumping references. Instead, summarize the main contribution of each referenced paper in a separate sentence.
Answer: Thank you for your valuable remark. We have avoided lumping references.
Moreover, we have summarized the main contribution of each referenced paper in a separate sentence.
Reviewer 1 - Comment 3
Literature review should be improved. The authors should conclude the limitations of the previously published paper and clearly describe the knowledge gap.
Answer: The literature review has been improved to conclude the limitations of previously published papers and the knowledge gap has been clearly described at the end.
Reviewer 1 - Comment 4
The reviewer suggests that the contributions and the paper organization should be located at the end of the state-of-the-art section since the contribution is an addressing of the knowledge gap concluded from the conducted review of the published works.
Answer: Thank you for the remark. The contribution of the paper has been included at the end of the state-of-the-art section.
Reviewer 1 - Comment 5
In the mathematical foundation, that seems insufficient and requires more investigation, the involved parameters in an equation should be explained at its end before the following equation.
Answer: Thank you for your valuable comment. The mathematical foundation has been re-examined. As for the parameters, they have been explained before each equation.
Reviewer 1 - Comment 6: The conclusions should be summarized in bullet points.
Answer: Thanks for the comment. The manuscript has been updated to summarize the paper’s conclusions in bullet points.
Thank you again for your contribution to the improvement of our work. We look forward to the opportunity to address any further concerns you may have.
Author Response File: 
Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 2 Report
Overall thought this was a well thought out paper and very interesting concept on how to work with LEM.
There are a few areas where I would like to see some changes or additions.
Table 1: The Total cost appears to be in Euros, but the titles have (%) suggesting the number is a percentage change. From the body, I believe it is in Euros, so ensure table titles are appropriately marked.
For Figures 8 and 9, the body of the text states that as the probability decreases, the total expected cost increases, yet the tables show that as the probability increases, the total expected cost increases. Please clarify and ensure the text matches what the figures show.
Overall experiment: While you describe where the data was collected and give some facts about it, the overall experiment is not described very well for me. It appears that you are reporting on a single's day worth of data, but I can't tell if that is a single day's worth of data or an average over multiple days. Was the data collected in the summer or winter (assuming summer since mentioned HVAC being main draw)? Did you collect over multiple summer days and choose the best or the worst, or an average day...or again, did you average over the course of a week, a month, etc. The results look promising and very interesting, but there is no way I could even come close to duplicating this experiment with more details.
Author Response
Reviewer 2 - Comment 1: The Total cost appears to be in Euros, but the titles have (%) suggesting the number is a percentage change. From the body, I believe it is in Euros, so ensure table titles are appropriately marked.
Answer: Thank you for the comment. The manuscript has been updated and the titles have been changed appropriately.
Reviewer 2 - Comment 2
For Figures 8 and 9, the body of the text states that as the probability decreases, the total expected cost increases, yet the tables show that as the probability increases, the total expected cost increases. Please clarify and ensure the text matches what the figures show.
Answer: The probability shows the probability of constraint violation. In the case of probability 1 (close to the deterministic optimization problem), there is no violation, so the total cost is the maximum. For any probability lower than this case the cost is lower since there is more flexibility in respecting the constraints.
Reviewer 2 - Comment 3
Overall experiment: While you describe where the data was collected and give some facts about it, the overall experiment is not described very well for me. It appears that you are reporting on a single day's worth of data, but I can't tell if that is a single day's worth of data or an average over multiple days.
Was the data collected in the summer or winter (assuming summer since mentioned HVAC being the main draw) ?
Did you collect over multiple summer days and choose the best or the worst, or an average day...or again, did you average over the course of a week, a month, etc. The results look promising and very interesting, but there is no way I could even come close to duplicating this experiment with more details.
Answer: Thank you for your remark. We have updated the information accordingly.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 3 Report
The manuscript entitled “Local Energy Market-Consumer Digital Twin Coordination for Optimal Energy Price Discovery under Thermal Comfort Constraints” proposes a digital platform to promote the development of local energy markets. The paper presents an interesting theme and is well-written. However, there are some topics that I believe could be improved.
MAJOR COMMENTS:
1) INTRODUCTION: The Introduction section must be improved. This section should provide a brief introduction to the topic, delimit the research gap, the objective, highlight the novelty of the research, and provide a brief explanation of the methodology to be used. Contextualization was carried out, but the other items were not properly addressed. The paper contributions were listed, however, in my opinion, this is not the best way to present them. Furthermore, I don't think the Introduction is the best place to inform the reader about them either.
2) CONCLUSIONS: Work limitations should be clearly described in this section.
MINOR COMMENTS:
3) ABSTRACT: I suggest avoiding the use of personal pronouns in the text. Maybe replace “We show that the IoT technology...” with “This study presents how IoT technology...”. Same for other parts of the text that use the pronoun “We”.
4) All abbreviations must be cited in full the first time they appear, both in the text and in the Abstract. Although they have already been cited in the Abstract, they must be explained again in the text. For example:
- Line 21: “EU”;
- Line 27: “EVs”;
- Line 32: “TES”;
- Line 33: “LEM”; and so on.
Please check all text. The presence of an abbreviation table at the end of the paper does not exempt its full citation throughout the text.
5) Line 23: I believe the abbreviation DER should be in parentheses.
6) Page 8: I don't understand why the first equation is Equation 5. Where are the previous four? Please check the numbering of the equations.
7) Figures 4, 5, 6, 8, and 9: Please review the title of these figures. The title must be short and self-explanatory. Further explanations on the interpretation of the figure or graph should be provided in the text.
8) Figures should be placed close to where they are first cited in the text. For example, Figure 5.
9) Line 515: The figure number was replaced by "??". Please check.
10) Avoid placing the figures in the middle of the paragraphs, which makes it difficult to read. Please check all figures.
11) I was only able to read the data in Figure 11 at 300% zoom. Please check if you can improve the scale.
Author Response
The manuscript entitled “Local Energy Market-Consumer Digital Twin Coordination for Optimal Energy Price Discovery under Thermal Comfort Constraints” proposes a digital platform to promote the development of local energy markets. The paper presents an interesting theme and is well-written. However, there are some topics that I believe could be improved.
Reviewer 3 - Comment 1
INTRODUCTION: The Introduction section must be improved. This section should provide a brief introduction to the topic, delimit the research gap, the objective, highlight the novelty of the research, and provide a brief explanation of the methodology to be used. Contextualization was carried out, but the other items were not properly addressed. The paper contributions were listed, however, in my opinion, this is not the best way to present them. Furthermore, I don't think the Introduction is the best place to inform the reader about them either.
Answer: Thank you for your remark. The Introduction section has been modified based on your comments. We have deleted some content and we have added a paragraph presenting the research gap, the paper’s objective, the main novelty and an explanation of the structure.
Reviewer 3 - Comment 2: CONCLUSIONS: Work limitations should be clearly described in this section.
Answer: Thank you for your remark. The work limitations have been clearly described in the conclusion section of the updated manuscript.
Reviewer 3 - Comment 3: ABSTRACT: I suggest avoiding the use of personal pronouns in the text. Maybe replace “We show that the IoT technology...” with “This study presents how IoT technology...”. Same for other parts of the text that use the pronoun “We”.
Answer: In response to your comment, we have replaced all the personal pronouns both in the abstract and across the manuscript.
Reviewer 3 - Comment 4: All abbreviations must be cited in full the first time they appear, both in the text and in the Abstract. Although they have already been cited in the Abstract, they must be explained again in the text. For example:
- Line 21: “EU”;
- Line 27: “EVs”;
- Line 32: “TES”;
- Line 33: “LEM”; and so on.
Please check all text. The presence of an abbreviation table at the end of the paper does not exempt its full citation throughout the text.
Answer: In response to your comment, the abbreviations have been cited in full the first time they appear in the abstract and in the text.
Reviewer 3 - Comment 5: Line 23: I believe the abbreviation DER should be in parentheses.
Answer: You are right, it has been corrected.
Reviewer 3 - Comment 6: I don't understand why the first equation is Equation 5. Where are the previous four? Please check the numbering of the equations.
Answer: You are correct. We have checked the equations and we numbered them correctly.
Reviewer 3 - Comment 7
Figures 4, 5, 6, 8, and 9: Please review the title of these figures. The title must be short and self-explanatory. Further explanations on the interpretation of the figure or graph should be provided in the text.
Answer: Thanks for your remark. The titles of Figures 4, 5, 6, 8 and 9 have been revised to be short and self-explanatory. In addition, further explanations have been provided in the text.
Reviewer 3 - Comment 8
Figures should be placed close to where they are first cited in the text. For example, Figure 5.
Answer: Thank you for highlighting this; it has been successfully addressed.
Reviewer 3 - Comment 9
Line 515: The figure number was replaced by "??". Please check
Answer: Thanks for your remark. It was LaTeX’s compiling error. Now, the figure’s number is shown.
Reviewer 3 - Comment 11
Avoid placing the figures in the middle of the paragraphs, which makes it difficult to read. Please check all figures.
Answer: Thanks for the remark. The position of each figure has been updated due to your comment.
Reviewer 3 - Comment 11
I was only able to read the data in Figure 11 at 300% zoom. Please check if you can improve the scale.
Answer: Unfortunately, Figure 11 is a screenshot of the Consumer Digital Twin platform which is a web-based application. Since the orientation and the sizes of a browser’s full screen differs from the template’s ones, the scale of Figure 11 cannot be magnified.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Reviewer 4 Report
This paper presents an integrated framework of the local energy market (LEM) and consumer digital twin (CDT) to maximise the flexibility potential of the market participants and enhance the market’s efficiency. Besides, a market design with different pricing mechanisms for the LEM transactions is also introduced. The manuscript is well-constructed and presented, making it appropriate for publication. However, there are some minor edit requirements to help this paper be more highly fascinating.
1. The authors should shortly describe the definition of the TES abbreviation in the early paragraph of the Introduction section.
2. Please recheck the miss typing in the paper and correct them, for example, the first sentence in Line#515, for example, In Figure??….
Author Response
Reviewer 4 - Comment 1
The authors should shortly describe the definition of the TES abbreviation in the early paragraph of the Introduction section.
Answer: Thanks for the remark. The TES abbreviation has been explained.
Reviewer 4 - Comment 2
Please recheck the miss typing in the paper and correct them, for example, the first sentence in Line#515, for example, In Figure??…
Answer: Thanks for the remark. The position of each figure has been updated due to your comment.
Author Response File: Author Response.pdf
Round 2
Reviewer 2 Report
Na
