Optimal Operation Strategy Considering Shared Hydrogen Energy Storage and Data Center Load Scheduling

Abstract

Data centers are facing rapidly increasing electricity demand and carbon emissions, while the intermittency of renewable energy creates a significant temporal mismatch between renewable generation and data center load demand. To bridge this temporal mismatch, we propose a coordinated optimization strategy that integrates shared hydrogen energy storage facilities with load scheduling mechanisms. A multi-objective MILP model is formulated to minimize annualized cost, renewable energy curtailment, and carbon emissions. Simulation results show that, compared with the no-shared-station case, the proposed electricity–hydrogen coordination strategy with load shifting yields significant benefits: the annualized total cost decreases from 13.65 to 4.74 million yuan; annual carbon emissions are reduced from 6297 to 1432 tons; and peak-period electricity purchases are reduced from 5373 to 906 MWh. Under the representative daily forecast condition, Scenario S4 achieves zero renewable curtailment when grid export is permitted; therefore, the renewable-electricity utilization rate reaches 100.00% within the model boundary. When grid export is prohibited, the utilization rate decreases to 98.59%, with 179,100 kWh of annualized renewable curtailment. The research findings indicate that integrating shared hydrogen energy storage with the load flexibility of data centers can effectively reduce the system’s overall operating costs, promote the integration of renewable energy, and achieve low-carbon operation.