Parametric study of variable renewable energy integration in Europe: Advantages and costs of transmission grid extensions

Schaber, Katrin; Steinke, Florian; Mühlich, P.; Hamacher, Thomas

doi:10.1016/j.enpol.2011.12.016

Cited by 146 publications

(92 citation statements)

References 3 publications

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“…The pricedampening effect of NTC expansion reaches up to 2-6% in the middle (of the road) and 5-9% in the optimistic scenarios. These findings are in line with the model results of Schaber et al (2012b), who calculate that optimal grid extension leads to 7-11% lower average electricity prices. However, one needs to acknowledge that the average electricity prices differ much more across investment cost scenarios.…”

Section: Electricity Price Distributionssupporting

confidence: 81%

“…Tröster et al (2011) calculate that, if the European electricity transmission grid is configured in an optimal manner given a specific feed-in structure of renewables providing a share of 97%, curtailment can be cut by two thirds from 12% to 4%, thereby reducing the need for investments into renewable generation capacities. Schaber et al (2012b) find in a parametric study that for a European electricity system with 60% renewables, an optimal grid configuration in combination with an optimal mix between wind and solar capacities can even reduce curtailment to less than 1% as well as dampen the need for additional back-up capacities. These system effects lower the average cost of electricity by 7% as compared to a scenario with no grid extensions; and by 11% in a variant that assumes lower specific investment costs for the renewable technologies solar photovoltaic, wind onshore and offshore.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Quantifying the long-term economic benefits of European electricity system integration

Schmid

Knopf

2015

Energy Policy

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This paper analyses a set of model-based decarbonization scenarios in order to quantify the long-term economic benefits that arise from an increasing integration of the pan-European electricity system. It thereby focuses on the interplay between transmission infrastructure and renewable generation capacity expansion. We confirm earlier findings that, on aggregate, pan-European transmission capacity expansion constitutes a no-regret option for integrating increasing shares of variable renewables in mitigation scenarios with positive social returns on investment. However, it turns out that the change in total discounted system costs that occurs as transmission capacity expansion increases is modest in magnitude, with a maximum of 3.5% for a case with no expansion compared to one with massive expansion. In technical terms this means that the optimum is rather flat and that taking into account regional and local benefits and distributional aspects, could alter the evaluation of the economic benefits considerably. A crucial finding in this context is that the configuration of pan-European transmission infrastructure and the importance of specific country-connections, i.e. a "Southern" versus a "Northern" solution, crucially hinges on the relative development of specific investment costs for solar and wind technologies over the next decades.

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Section: Electricity Price Distributionssupporting

confidence: 81%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Quantifying the long-term economic benefits of European electricity system integration

Schmid

Knopf

2015

Energy Policy

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“…Many of the problems related to the exchange of the electricity supply technology in a rather short period could be ameliorated by a European wide approach. This is well documented in the scientific literature [27,28]. Within an EU-wide grid the degree of intermittency and to a lesser extent the variation of the load is reduced.…”

Section: Economymentioning

confidence: 67%

Electricity by intermittent sources: An analysis based on the German situation 2012

Wagner

2014

Eur. Phys. J. Plus

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Abstract. The 2012 data of the German load, the on-and offshore and the photo-voltaic energy production are used and scaled to the limit of supplying the annual demand (100% case). The reference mix of the renewable energy (RE) forms is selected such that the remaining back-up energy is minimised. For the 100% case, the RE power installation has to be about 3 times the present peak load. The back-up system can be reduced by 12% in this case. The surplus energy corresponds to 26% of the demand. The back-up system and more so the grid must be able to cope with large power excursions. All components of the electricity supply system operate at low capacity factors. Large-scale storage can hardly be motivated by the effort to further reduce CO 2 emission. Demand-side management will intensify the present periods of high economic activities. Its rigorous implementation will expand the economic activities into the weekends. On the basis of a simple criterion, the increase of periods with negative electricity prices in Germany is assessed. It will be difficult with RE to meet the low CO 2 emission factors which characterise those European Countries which produce electricity mostly by nuclear and hydro power.

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“…Weather-driven network modelling represents a more direct approach to obtain estimates on the required backup infrastructure of highly renewable large-scale energy systems [21][22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29]. Weather data covering multiple years are converted into prospective wind and solar power generation with good spatial and temporal resolution [21,22,[30][31][32], and are then used as the driving force in networked electricty system models.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Principal Mismatch Patterns Across a Simplified Highly Renewable European Electricity Network

et al. 2017

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Due to its spatio-temporal variability, the mismatch between the weather and demand patterns challenges the design of highly renewable energy systems. A principal component analysis is applied to a simplified networked European electricity system with a high share of wind and solar power generation. It reveals a small number of important mismatch patterns, which explain most of the system's required backup and transmission infrastructure. Whereas the first principal component is already able to reproduce most of the temporal mismatch variability for a solar dominated system, a few more principal components are needed for a wind dominated system. Due to its monopole structure the first principal component causes most of the system's backup infrastructure. The next few principal components have a dipole structure and dominate the transmission infrastructure of the renewable electricity network.

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Parametric study of variable renewable energy integration in Europe: Advantages and costs of transmission grid extensions

Cited by 146 publications

References 3 publications

Quantifying the long-term economic benefits of European electricity system integration

Quantifying the long-term economic benefits of European electricity system integration

Electricity by intermittent sources: An analysis based on the German situation 2012

Principal Mismatch Patterns Across a Simplified Highly Renewable European Electricity Network

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