Robust Decision Making to Create a Resilient Bulk Power System and Understand Risks in the Western United States
The summer 2024 federal electricity reliability assessment found large areas of the country are at risk for electricity shortages because of high-impact weather patterns causing supply and demand imbalances. To mitigate the risk of electricity shortages, we need to create robust methods of predicting and planning for shifts in regional demand and generation profiles caused by climate change. Merging high resolution meteorological data with energy system analysis is critical to producing these insights. Here we use the WUS-D3 dynamically downscaled GCM dataset at a 9km hourly resolution to analyze changes in demand, net demand, and surplus availability capacity (SAC) of electricity in the Western Electricity Coordinating Council (WECC). We will extend this work by finding optimal capacity expansion pathways for WECC via energy systems models and a robust decision-making (RDM) framework. Expansion pathways will be generated through minimizing hours of low surplus available capacity in a mixed integer linear programming model under differing levels of renewable penetrations. To test the resource adequacy of the created future power systems, a stochastic, Monte Carlo-based simulation model will quantify when loss of load occurs. To create fully robust systems and characterize potential risks, we will utilize 14 GCMs in the WUS-D3 dataset to account for uncertainty in future climate realities. This combination of modeling in an RDM approach will allow us to measure risks posed by designing system expansion to differing levels of robustness.
Using regression models to forecast demand and hydropower with predictions of solar and wind capacity factors, we find that all areas of WECC will experience significant losses in SAC within the next twenty-five years if the generation portfolio is not altered. The NWPP Central and the CAMX regions face the largest risks under SSP370. These predictions consider solar, wind, and hydro generation plus capacity derates in thermal generation from temperature and humidity profiles. Moving forward in research and industry, we need to understand the most robust options for capacity expansion in the bulk power system to counter these predicted treads and analyze the risks posed by making tradeoffs between robustness, cost, and other policy objectives.
Christino, Martha, Michael Craig, and Allison Steiner. "Robust Decision Making to Create a Resilient Bulk Power System and Understand Risks in the Western United States." AGU24 (2024). CSS24-64