Impact of Time Resolution on the Projected Rates of System Penetration by Intermittent Generation Technologies

摘要

To hedge against the limited resources of fossil fuels and to reduce the emissions of green house gases, it is expected that our future electricity system will include more intermittent technologies, including wind and PV. To better understand how to develop energy systems that rely on intermittents, systems models are used to assess the cost at which intermittents become competitive, the degree of penetration as their costs are reduced, their impact on the optimal structure of the balance of the system, and their affect on total system costs. Modeling approaches designed for dispatchable technologies are not entirely appropriate for modeling intermittent technologies, since they, naturally, assume that generation can always be dispatched to meet demand. Intermittent generation cannot be dispatched--its output varies from hour to hour and from day to day on its own schedule, heedless to system needs. This research assesses the difference in results associated with the different approaches to modeling intermittency.