Privacy preservation method for MIQP-based energy management problem: A cloud-edge framework

•An Information Masking method for MIQP problem is proposed.•The proof for the precise recovery of the optimal solution is given.•Information masking mechanism for MIQP is designed in a cloud-edge framework.•Privacy preservation and computation cost are elaborated to adapt to real applications. The increasing development of information and communication technologies in power grid makes it possible to optimize the energy management of numerous physical users with cloud-based service, while users’ concerns about privacy security have attracted increasingly more attention. To attack this challenge, this paper proposes the information masking (IM) method for the energy management problem in the form of mixed-integer quadratic programming (MIQP). Additionally, the feasibility and optimality of the recovered solution in the IM of MIQP is proven and given in the form of two lemmas. Next, the implementation mechanism of IM is designed based on a cloud-edge framework. Furthermore, the general requirements of the IM of MIQP are elaborated with respect to privacy security and computational cost to better accommodate practical applications. Finally, the optimal schedule of microgrid with on-site generators and flexible demand resources is modelled and simulated to demonstrate the feasibility and effectiveness of the proposed methodology.