ENERGY CONTROL UTILIZING A VIRTUAL POWER PLANT

A power distribution system includes an electrical utility and at least one virtual power plant. The virtual power plant can be utilized and controlled in order to support the operations of the electrical utility. Upon determining an electrical need, the utility instructs the virtual power plant to make an energy adjustment by a scheduled time. The virtual power plant allocates the energy adjustment among the distributed energy resources of its fleet in order to achieve the energy adjustment by the scheduled time.