A new methodology for predicting the GHG emission reductions due to electricity savings in the residential sector.

摘要

In Canada, each province has its own electric utility system, and each system is responsible for meeting the demand of its customer base. Electricity demand in all provinces is highly variable throughout the day, as well as during the year, and the electric utility system operators must ensure that electricity demand is met continuously. In order to achieve a good match between electricity demand and generation, a mix of base load and peaking load power plants are used, which use different fuel sources.;The magnitude of and the fuel used for marginal electricity generation vary from province to province and from hour to hour. To estimate the reduction in GHG emissions, it is necessary to have information on both the magnitude of the marginal electricity generation, and the fuel used to generate the marginal electricity for each province on an hourly time scale. However, this information is regarded confidential by most utilities and is not made public. In addition, due to the continuously changing operational and economic conditions, it is practically impossible to predict with precision the magnitude of the marginal generation and the fuel used on a time scale of hours, or even days.;The objective of this research is to develop a realistic and viable methodology to calculate the amount of GHG emission reductions associated with the reduction in electricity consumption due to implementing solar technologies or energy efficiency measures. Since electricity savings will be within the marginal capacity, a marginal GHG intensity factor (g CO2eq/kWh), which is the amount of GHG emissions produced as result of producing one kWh of electricity on the margin, is estimated for each province based on published estimates of marginal generation magnitude and fuels used for marginal generation.;The results obtained are compared with the estimates obtained from previous studies that utilize average GHG intensity factors and GHG intensity factors for only fossil fuel fired power plants.;When a solar technology or an energy efficiency measure is implemented on a wide scale in the residential sector that results in electricity savings, the electricity savings reflect in the peak (marginal) electricity generation. Thus, the greenhouse gas emission (GHG) reduction due to the reduction in electricity generation corresponds to the fuel used to generate the electricity at the margin.