IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 24
Traditional utility business models face the threat of
revenue erosion from both reduced wheeling of energy through
utility assets and overall lowering of energy demand.
Macroeconomic futures can define paths of power sector development where each future may have an internal
consistency of assumptions. For example, a macroeconomic future with high LNG prices might lead a country
to develop alternatives to generating with LNG. Alternatively, an island nation dependent on fuel-oil burning
and thus having risk in electricity rates tied to world oil
market volatility may assume a renewables future, trading
high short-run marginal costs or financing capital costs for
renewables.
Macroeconomic futures can be based on the status quo,
where it is business as usual: burning fuel oil or burning
coal for relatively significant electricity production. On the
other hand, macroeconomic futures can be help construct
scenarios based on a high penetration of renewables, nuclear
renaissance, global war, fossil fuel persistence, and other
variables.
In addition, macroeconomic futures may take into
account particular sensitivities such as high/low fuel prices,
high/low demand, high/low capital costs for renewables, and
others. State-of-the-art approaches used today to forecast
tomorrow's electricity costs and prices combine the macroeconomic frameworks with advanced least-cost resource
optimization methods that can reflect energy, transportation,
and reliability constraints.
Evolution of Planning Processes
For decades, state-of-the-art accepted practice among power
engineers has been to design the networks around peak load.
The rationale of designing the grid to peak load was that
this was often the point of highest stress in terms of thermal
capability of transmission, angular stability, voltage stability, and so forth. Many major transmission projects have
been justified for reliability concerns of transferring power,
maintaining voltages within a threshold, and maintaining
angular stability, as well as for other reasons such as security
of supply under contingency.
New Algorithms and Computing Power
Innovations in computing algorithms and computing power
have enabled power engineers to develop complex models
of the physics of network power flows and test many conditions around an instantaneous condition. These power flow
algorithms have been largely based on a snapshot in time
such as a moment of peak demand or a moment of minimum demand.
24
ieee power & energy magazine
Longer Chronologies
More recently, concern has arisen over long-term chronological
reliability. In the past, chronological concerns in the planning
process focused primarily on short-duration transients. An
example of a longer duration chronological concern is the intermittency of renewables and the constraints of maneuvering a
thermal plant on a subhourly basis while regulating reserves
and spinning reserves in subhourly intervals, taking into
account the previous state of the system and future potential
system states where grid stress can emerge in off-peak hours.
While snapshot and transient analysis at peak conditions is still
necessary in macroeconomic futures, these methods may no
longer be sufficient in grid design for adoption of technologies
in supply, transport, and demand. There can be scarcity and
abundance of quantities of energy, reserves and regulation, and
capacity at peak or off peak, which can drive electricity price
processes both in the short and long run that snapshot load
flow/transient analysis cannot explain or forecast.
Heuristic Versus Economic Considerations
Often we see power engineers highly focused on thermal transfer
capability of transmission, maintaining voltage thresholds, angular stability, and security of supply under contingency for what
are called base cases. These base cases are a set of assumptions
of demands, generation, network developments, and others of the
future that then the power engineer subjects to a cadre of tests for
reliability measures and assessment of the robustness of the future
systems to such assumptions.
It is the process of deriving these assumptions that is
challenged by the economics of technology options and
macroeconomic futures. Given that we have many options
for future developments of power sectors globally, in the
past we have seen all kinds of heuristic assumptions as
inputs to the power flow programs such as demand forecasts, dispatch assumptions, generation assumptions, and
assumptions about future policy and regulatory constructs.
Heuristic assumptions might be deterministic or manual,
and the absence of economic competition of assumptions
might be, for example, the power engineer assuming locations and amounts of deactivated generation units, locations,
and capacities of new generators, levels of penetration of distributed generation, energy efficiency, and other impacts of
regulatory and public policy.
In the era of many options, a heuristic assumption process can only bias the planning of future systems where it is
necessary to economically test options in optimizations that
july/august 2015
Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - Cover1
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - Cover2
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 1
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 2
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 3
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 4
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 5
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 6
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 7
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 8
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 9
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 10
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 11
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 12
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 13
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 14
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 15
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 16
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 17
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 18
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 19
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 20
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 21
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 22
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 23
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 24
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 25
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 26
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 27
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 28
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 29
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 30
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 31
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 32
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 33
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 34
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 35
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 36
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 37
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 38
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 39
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 40
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 41
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 42
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 43
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 44
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 45
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 46
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 47
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 48
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 49
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 50
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 51
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 52
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 53
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 54
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 55
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 56
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 57
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 58
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 59
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 60
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 61
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 62
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 63
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 64
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 65
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 66
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 67
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 68
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 69
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 70
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 71
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 72
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 73
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 74
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 75
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 76
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 77
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 78
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 79
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 80
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 81
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 82
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 83
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 84
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 85
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 86
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 87
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 88
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 89
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 90
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 91
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 92
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 93
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 94
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 95
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 96
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 97
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 98
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 99
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 100
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 101
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 102
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 103
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 104
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 105
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 106
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 107
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 108
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 109
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 110
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 111
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - 112
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - Cover3
IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2015 - Cover4
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_091020
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_070820
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_050620
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_030420
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_010220
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_111219
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_091019
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_070819
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_050619
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_030419
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_010219
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_111218
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_091018
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_070818
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_050618
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_030418
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_010218
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_111217
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_091017
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_070817
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_050617
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_030417
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_010217
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_111216
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_091016
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_070816
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_050616
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_030416
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_010216
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/ieee/powerenergy_010216
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_111215
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_091015
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_070815
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_050615
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_030415
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_010215
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_111214
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_091014
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_070814
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_050614
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_030414
https://www.nxtbook.com/nxtbooks/pes/powerenergy_010214
https://www.nxtbookmedia.com