Automated Demand Response Technology Demonstration for Small and Medium Commercial Buildings

This project aims to identify available technologies suitable for automating demand response for small-medium commercial buildings; to validate the extent to which that technology does what it claims to be able to do; and determine the extent to which customers find the technology useful for DR purpose.  Ten sites, enabled by eight vendors, participated in at least four test AutoDR events per site in the summer of 2010. The results showed that while existing technology can reliably receive OpenADR signals and translate them into pre-programmed response strategies, it is likely that better load sheds could be obtained than what is reported here if better understanding of the building systems were developed and the DR strategies had been carefully designed and optimized for each site.