Large balancing areas and dispersed renewable investment enhance grid flexibility in a renewable-dominant power system in China
Large balancing areas and dispersed renewable investment enhance grid flexibility in a renewable-dominant power system in China
Jiang Lin*, Nikit Abhyankar, Gang He, Xu Liu, and Shengfei Yin
iScience (2022)
DOI: 10.1016/j.isci.2022.103749
Abstract
Renewable energy is poised to play a major role in achieving China’s carbon neutrality goal by 2060; however, reliability and flexibility is a big concern of a renewable-dominant power system. Various strategies of enhancing flexibility are under discussion to ensure the reliability of such a system, but no detailed quantitative analysis has been reported yet in China. We combine the advantages of a capacity expansion model, SWITCH-China, with a production simulation model, PLEXOS, and analyze flexibility options under different scenarios of a renewable-dominant power system in China. We find that a larger balancing area offers direct flexibility benefits. Regional balancing could reduce the renewable curtailment rate by 5–7%, compared with a provincial balancing strategy. National balancing could further reduce the power cost by about 16%. However, retrofitting coal power plants for flexible operation would only improve the system flexibility marginally.
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Citation
@article{lin2022,
author = {Lin, Jiang and Abhyankar, Nikit and He, Gang and Liu, Xu and
Yin, Shengfei},
title = {Large Balancing Areas and Dispersed Renewable Investment
Enhance Grid Flexibility in a Renewable-Dominant Power System in
{China}},
journal = {iScience},
volume = {25},
number = {2},
pages = {103749},
date = {2022-01-07},
url = {https://www.cell.com/action/showPdf?pii=S2589-0042%2822%2900019-0},
doi = {10.1016/j.isci.2022.103749},
langid = {en}
}