Scenarios for the future Brazilian power sector based on a multi-criteria assessment

Abstract

The Brazilian power generation sector faces a paradigm change driven by, on one hand, a shift from a hydropower dominated mix and, on the other hand, international goals for reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The objective of this work is to evaluate five scenarios for the Brazilian power sector until 2050 using a multi-criteria decision analysis tool. These scenarios include a baseline trend and low carbon policy scenarios based on carbon taxes and carbon emission limits. To support the applied methodology, a questionnaire was elaborated to integrate the perceptions of experts on the scenario evaluation process. Considering the results from multi-criteria analysis, scenario preference followed the order of increasing share of renewables in the power sector. The preferable option for the future Brazilian power sector is a scenario where wind and biomass have a major contribution. The robustness of the multi-criteria tool applied in this study was tested by a sensitivity analysis. This analysis demonstrated that, regardless of the respondents' preferences and backgrounds, scenarios with higher shares of fossil fuel sources are the least preferable option, while scenarios with major contributions from wind and biomass are the preferable option to supply electricity in Brazil through 2050.

Power generation expansion planning with complementarity between renewable sources and regions for 100% renewable energy systems

“…32 Most researches have used linear programming to solve these problems, 22,28 including the Message model, 29 and a few of researches have used a multi-criteria decision analysis 30 or non-linear programming. 33 In these works, the optimal mix can be found minimizing the expansion cost, 25,29,30,34 minimizing the thermal power generation and the loss of load, 22,28 minimizing the energy surpluses and deficits, 33,34 or minimizing the cost of energy storage. 10,35 Nevertheless, in countries with large reservoirs (eg, Brazil), these optimization models do not optimize the hydropower's flow neither the use of reservoirs.…”

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“…As emissões do setor partiram de um patamar de 220,8 milhões de toneladas de dióxido de carbono equivalente (CO2) em 1990 para 449,3 milhões de toneladas em 2013, superando as emissões da agropecuária e praticamente equiparando-se às emissões por mudança de uso da terra (Azevedo et al, 2017). O Brasil vem mantendo um esforço contínuo para manutenção de uma matriz energética limpa no intuito de atender os compromissos internacionais assumidos (Malagueta et al, 2014;Brasil, 2015;Santos et al, 2017). A Oferta Interna de Energia Elétrica (OIEE) no Brasil, para o ano de 2015, ficou em 615,9 TWh.…”

The Brazilian Electricity Supply for 2030: A Projection Based on Economic, Environmental and Technical Criteria

“…These accounted for 22% of the national electricity mix in 2015 (EPE, 2015;Kileber & Parente, 2015). The low price of coal in the international market and the development and exploitation of domestic pre-salt oil reserves favored fossil sources more than the others (Santos et al, 2017). Nevertheless, the expansion of the energy supply to such sources prompted concerns in the environmental sciences and several discussions about the energy sector's share in the emission of Green House Gases (GHG) have been initiated.…”

“…In this context, Brazil stands out by supporting, through the Alternative Energy Sources Incentive Program (PROINFA) and The Ten-year Energy Expansion Plan (PDE), investments in systems based on renewable sources (wind, solar, and biomass) to supplement hydropower generation units (Pao & Fu, 2013;Santos et al, 2017). Projections of the Brazilian Energy Matrix depict scenarios based on established targets for mitigating the impacts associated with GHG emissions by the year 2030 compared with 2005.…”

“…In parallel, LCA methods have been also incorporated into optimization problems allowing the increase of robustness of models and results (Argaski et al, 2016;Hacatoglu et al, 2015;Maxim, 2014;Santos et al, 2017;Stamford & Azapagic, 2014). However, except for Portugal- Pereira et al (2016), which evaluated the implications of applying Life Cycle Assessment of GHG emissions (LCA-GHG) into the optimization of the Brazilian power generation mix through 2050, other studies with similar approaches were not found in the technical-academic literature.…”