The "Implementation Plan for Virtual Power Plant Participation in Electricity Market Trading in Guangdong Province" (hereinafter referred to as the "Plan") recently issued by the Guangdong Provincial Energy Bureau and the Southern Regulatory Bureau of the National Energy Administration stipulates that virtual power plant operators and aggregated resources that meet market access conditions can participate in electricity market trading in Guangdong Province. A virtual power plant is a platform for managing and scheduling distributed energy resources Zhao Ruifeng, the manager of the Automation Department at the Guangdong Power Dispatching and Control Center of Southern Power Grid, introduced that virtual power plants use new generation information communication, system integration and other technologies to zero out scattered power loads such as charging piles, air conditioning, energy storage, and distributed new energy in the power grid. They are the "agents" of many small resources. As an "agent", what resources can virtual power plants "represent" to participate in market transactions? The Plan specifies that load type virtual power plants aggregate all the electricity generated by users with regulation capabilities (including user side energy storage) and register in the market as electricity users; The aggregation of virtual power plants in the power generation category includes distributed photovoltaics, distributed wind power, and distributed independent energy storage that have independent access points to access resources with voltage levels of 380V/220V. Market registration is processed using power generation projects as trading units. In other words, load based virtual power plants aggregate adjustable resources on the user side and respond to grid demand by adjusting electricity loads; Virtual power plants for power generation provide electricity and auxiliary services to the grid by integrating distributed power generation resources. As one of the first regional level virtual power plants to be put into operation in the southern region, Guangdong Power Grid's "Yueneng Investment" platform has been connected to various types of distributed adjustable resources since its launch in 2021. The aggregated resource scale is huge, the resource categories are wide, and the response capability is basically close to that of physical power plants. This lays the foundation for the platform's next step of "market trading". At present, we are preparing for the registration and admission process of virtual power plant operators, striving to participate in the 'market entry' as one of the first virtual power plants in Guangdong, "said Li Haidong, Deputy General Manager of the Platform Division of Southern Power Grid Guangdong Power Grid Energy Investment Co., Ltd. At present, one of the functions of virtual power plants is to enhance the regulation capability of the power system and help balance the supply and demand of the power system. Previously, virtual power plants in Guangdong Province only participated in market-oriented demand response through invitations and other means, with limited business models Luo Jinqing, Deputy Manager of the Development Research Department of Guangdong Power Trading Center of Southern Power Grid Guangdong Power Grid, said that since the establishment and application of the demand response trading mechanism in 2021, Guangdong Province has organized a total of 86 transactions and settled compensation funds totaling 1.137 billion yuan. After the release of the 'Plan', in addition to participating in demand response, virtual power plants can provide quantity quotations, participate in energy market transactions for all electricity, and provide value-added services such as energy conservation for aggregated users, achieving a win-win situation between users and systems, technology and business models, and enhancing sustainable development capabilities Huang Youpeng, Deputy Manager of the Load Management Department of Guangdong Provincial Power Load Management Center, said. Next, Guangdong Power Grid will accelerate the integration of demand side resources such as distributed new energy and user side energy storage into virtual power plants, organize qualification review, system integration, capability verification and certification related to virtual power plants, coordinate the specific implementation of load management and professional management of virtual power plants, and provide support services for virtual power plants to participate in various market transactions. (New Society)