Comparing generation cost of DG and thermal power plants by considering their generation impacts on health

摘要

Climate change by electricity generation is one of greatest challenges facing the human race. The conventional power plants that are heavily combustion based, contributing markedly to emission stock of many criteria and hazardous air pollutants. Parallel with this, private ownership of power production, and governmental organizations have been supporting the extension of small-scale, distributed generation (DG) technologies as compared to the traditional power plants. In this paper, some indexes are introduced to investigate the environmental benefits of DG. Furthermore, a mathematical method for calculating the accurate generation cost of renewable sources is established based on the environmental indicators. The environmental value of pollutant emissions and health impact of air pollution depends on the pollutant type are also considered.