This MW scale virtual power plant service provides commercial frequency regulating response to National Grid in the UK.

"Virtual power plants represent an 'Internet of Energy,'" says senior analyst Peter Asmus of Pike Research.

STEAG's virtual power plant sells balancing power to German TSOs.

Through a partnership with a Virtual power plant they also export their excess power to the grid and automatically add extra power to the grid at times of peak demand.

A virtual power plant is a cluster of distributed generation installations (such as microCHP, wind-turbines, small hydro, back-up gensets etc.) which are collectively run by a central control entity.

However, everything that you have been calling for - energy security, more efficiency, intelligent networks, decentralised networks, the supergrid, the micro grid, the virtual power plants - needs ICT to be run.

Smart grid capabilities use the local grid's transmission and distribution network to coordinate distributed generation, grid storage and consumption into a cluster that appears to the super grid as a virtual power plant.

In the United States, Virtual Power Plants not only deal with the supply side, but also help manage demand and ensure reliability of grid functions through demand response (DR) and other load shifting approaches, in real time.

For example, distribution grids in rural areas might generate more energy than they use, turning the local smart grid into a virtual power plant, or a city's fleet of one million electric vehicles could be used to trim peaks in transmission supply by integrating them to the smart grid using vehicle to grid technology.