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This study evaluates rule-based versus reinforcement learning (RL) pricing mechanisms for peer-to-peer electricity trading in residential photovoltaic communities, utilizing a Deep Q-Network for the RL approach. The findings reveal that while rule-based pricing mechanisms generally outperform the best RL policy in a PV-only setup, the introduction of battery energy storage significantly enhances the performance of RL policies, leading to increased community savings. Notably, SDR-shaped pricing consistently outperforms multiplier-based pricing across various configurations, highlighting the competitive nature of rule-based methods in this context.
Rule-based pricing mechanisms consistently outperform reinforcement learning approaches in peer-to-peer electricity trading, even as energy storage boosts RL performance.
This paper compares rule-based and learning-based pricing mechanisms for peer-to-peer (P2P) electricity trading in residential photovoltaic communities. The rule-based benchmarks comprise bill-sharing as an ex post allocation mechanism, the mid-market rate, and supply-demand-ratio pricing. The reinforcement-learning (RL) formulation is implemented through a Deep Q-Network and evaluated under multiplier-based and learnable SDR-shaped pricing, with a fixed-parameter SDR variant as a non-learning control. Performance is assessed through community savings together with complementary financial and operational indicators. In the base PV-only configuration, the rule-based benchmarks outperform the best RL policy. With battery energy storage, evaluated for the RL policies only, community savings under the best RL policy increase from EUR 734.23 to EUR 978.52. Across the learning-based modes and in both configurations, SDR-shaped pricing outperforms the multiplier-based parameterization considered. The results indicate that rule-based pricing remains highly competitive wherever the two families are compared directly, and that storage substantially improves the learning-based outcomes under this accounting, while the distribution of benefits remains heterogeneous across households.
