Maturity status

Stable

This article explains what peak shaving is, how it works with load management, and how to configure it in the XENON Dashboard.

What is the peak shaver?

The peak shaver reduces charging power to keep average power consumption within a defined threshold over each billing interval. Grid operators (DSOs) bill capacity charges based on the average power over the interval — not instantaneous peaks — so staying within the threshold reduces network charges.

Peak shaving is commonly used by charge point operators (CPOs) and commercial and industrial (C&I) customers with 15-minute measurement contracts.

How does the peak shaver work?

The algorithm monitors GCP power consumption every second, alongside the standard Dynamic Load Management (DLM) or Static Load Management (SLM) grid power limit.

Key behavior:

Unlike DLM or SLM — which enforce a hard instantaneous limit — the peak shaver maximizes the total energy consumed within each billing interval by allowing instantaneous power to exceed the threshold, as long as the average over the full interval does not exceed it
If unused capacity remains within the current billing interval, the algorithm releases additional charging power to make full use of the available headroom
As the interval progresses and the cumulative average approaches the threshold, EVCS charging power is curtailed to stay within the target

Both the DLM grid power limit and the peak shaving limit are applied simultaneously. The more restrictive of the two applies at any given moment.

Graphical representation of peak shaving

For SLM setups: A virtual meter aggregates EVCS measurements and setpoints to replicate GCP meter behavior. Account for expected uncontrollable load when setting the peak shaving threshold, since SLM cannot measure it directly.