The Role of CCS in Power Systems with High Levels of Renewables Penetration

McCoy, Sean; Bertsch, Joachim; Growitsch, Christian; Lorenczik, Stefan; Nagl, Stephan; Volk, Dennis; Finkenrath, Matthias; Davison, John

doi:10.1016/j.egypro.2013.06.151

Cited by 7 publications

(1 citation statement)

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“…Bertsch et al studied a future European low-carbon power system with a 80% RES penetration by 2050. They concluded that flexibility will largely be provided by gas turbines, and that operation of nuclear power and generators with CCS will break even [11,12]. Cohen studied the operation of power plants with CCS in detail for the Texas power system, but only considered wind penetrations up to 20% [13].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Operational flexibility and economics of power plants in future low-carbon power systems

et al. 2015

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h i g h l i g h t sKey flexibility parameters of current and future thermal power plants are quantified. Four power mix scenarios are designed and simulated with flexibility constraints. Low-carbon scenarios need more flexibility; which power plants can deliver. Power plant efficiency is reduced by variable residual load, not only renewables. The current market design only covers 84% (±30%) of total power costs per MWh. a b s t r a c t Future power systems will require large shares of low-carbon generators such as renewables and power plants with Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) to keep global warming below 2°C. Intermittent renewables increase the system-wide demand for flexibility and affect the operation of thermal power plants. We investigate the operation of future power plants by first composing a comprehensive overview of the operational flexibility of current and future power plants. Next, a combined long-term optimization and hourly simulation is performed with the soft-linked MARKAL-NL-UU and REPOWERS models for The Netherlands in 2030 and 2050. We quantify and compare the technical and economic performance of power plants for four distinctly different future scenarios. We find that future low-carbon power systems will have large shares of intermittent renewable sources (19-42%) and also a 2-38% higher variability in residual load compared to the Baseline scenario. Hence, power plant operation will be more variable, which reduces their efficiency by 0.6-1.6% compared to the full-load efficiency. Enough flexibility is present in future power systems to accommodate renewables, due to advances in power plant flexibility and interconnectors. As a result, generators with CCS have a large market share (23-64% of power generated). Moreover, the current energy-based market model generates insufficient revenues: the price received per MWh covers only 84% (±30%) of the total generation costs per MWh of 77 €/MWh (±12€). This will discourage new investments in generation capacity and reduce power system adequacy. New or additional market designs may be required to ensure system adequacy in future power systems.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%