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The Impacts of Renewable Energy Resource Variability on Conventional Thermal Generators

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The Impacts of Renewable Energy Resource Variability on Conventional Thermal Generators Abstracts of Conference Papers: TSBE EngD Conference, TSBE Centre, University of Reading, Whiteknights, RG6 6AF, 5th July 2011. http://www.reading.ac.uk/tsbe/ The Impacts Of Renewable Energy Resource Variability On Conventional Thermal Generators 1* 2 3 4 M. L. Kubik , P. J. Coker , C. Hunt and H. B. Awbi 1 Technologies for Sustainable Built Environments Centre, University of Reading, United Kingdom 2 School of Construction Management and Engineering, University of Reading, United Kingdom 3 AES, Richmond upon Thames, United Kingdom 4 Technologies for Sustainable Built Environments Centre, University of Reading, United Kingdom * Corresponding author: [email protected] ABSTRACT The Republic of Ireland and UK governments have put forward an ambitious target of 40% of electricity generation to be supplied with renewable sources by 2020. The dominant source of this energy is anticipated to come from wind power, as this is the most mature renewable technology. However, wind generation is inherently variable in its output, and this introduces significant challenges for the System Operator when balancing supply and demand. Although demand side management, energy storage and greater interconnection are all anticipated to help with dealing with the challenge of variability, conventional thermal generators will have a very significant role to play in balancing supply and demand. Running conventional generation more flexibly in order to cater for a wind led regime reduces the efficiency of the plant, as well as shortening its lifespan and increasing O&M costs. The link between variability and the impacts on conventional generation is not well addressed in current literature, but is of vital importance for informing the development of the generation mix. This paper introduces some of the potential impacts of greater variability on conventional generators, the past work that has gone into modelling these impacts and identifies areas of future work that need to be addressed. Keywords: Variability, intermittency, balancing, conventional generation, Ireland 1. INTRODUCTION Recognising a global consensus of the need to limit future carbon emissions, the Irish and UK governments, along with other EU-27 member states, agreed in 2008 an EU Climate and Energy Package (European Commission 2008). In contributing towards this legislation, the UK and Irish governments have set an ambitious target of 40% of annual electricity consumption to be met by renewable sources by 2020 within the Irish all island electricity market 1. Ireland is currently heavily dependent on conventional fossil fuels (Howley et al. 2009), but is amongst the most gifted in Europe in terms of renewable wind, wave and tidal resource (Rourke et al. 2009). Energy forecasts by Walker et al. (2009) suggest that under 1 Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland have a single common electricity market for wholesale electricity. 1 Abstracts of Conference Papers: TSBE EngD Conference, TSBE Centre, University of Reading, Whiteknights, RG6 6AF, 5th July 2011. http://www.reading.ac.uk/tsbe/ the legislation set out by Ireland’s 2007 Energy White Paper and subsequent energy targets the single largest renewable will be from wind (making up 65% of the 40% target alone). Although wind generation output is to an extent predictable, wind is inherently a variable resource, and this presents additional challenges for system balancing (Laughton 2007). There are a number of technological developments available to help address the impacts of a more variable generation pattern, but conventional generation plant is expected to play a significant role in smoothing out the generation profile when there is a shortfall of wind by running more flexibly. As many of the existing thermal generators will still be operational in 2020, it is particularly important to understand the impacts of a wind led regime on their performance. Such an understanding will inform the roadmap towards the integration of the levels of wind required to meet the ambitious goals set by the government. This paper introduces the current electricity market regime and the characteristics of conventional thermal generation. The specific challenges of variability for conventional thermal generation in Northern Ireland are highlighted, a research area that existing literature does not address. A need for more research into the impacts of variability on the operation of conventional plant is identified and proposed as a future direction for research. Figure 1 - Schematic of Northern Ireland power stations and transmission network, adapted from Kennedy (2007). 2. BACKGROUND 2.1. THE IRISH ALL ISLAND ELECTRICITY MARKET Since November 2007, a single electricity market (SEM) has operated for the whole island of Ireland, combining the two previously separate Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland systems. The SEM consists of a gross mandatory electricity pool, which all generators bid into (Pöyry 2007). All generators that make themselves available to the system are paid a capacity payment, designed to cover the capital costs of constructing the unit in the first place. The system operators, SONI for Northern Ireland and EirGrid for the Republic of 2 Abstracts of Conference Papers: TSBE EngD Conference, TSBE Centre, University of Reading, Whiteknights, RG6 6AF, 5th July 2011. http://www.reading.ac.uk/tsbe/ Ireland, select the most cost effective plant2 to satisfy an unconstrained schedule of demand from this pool based upon the operating characteristics submitted by the generator units in the market. All such merit order units are paid a system marginal price (SMP), determined by the cost of the most expensive (marginal) unit required to meet demand. System constraints, such as plants being non-operational for maintenance, the need for voltage regulation, or limits to the amount of electricity that can be carried by certain transmission lines, are then imposed and the necessary changes are made to construct a constrained schedule of demand. The key difference is that generators asked to run due to system constraints instead of on merit are only reimbursed their operating costs, and make no operating profit. This already presents a challenge for operators in Northern Ireland, as although they are part of a whole island market, there is limited interconnection across the border into the Republic of Ireland (Figure 2). This bottleneck prevents many merit order plant in the Republic of Ireland from satisfying demand in Northern Ireland. Further challenges emerge with the introduction of more variable generation; these will be addressed later in this paper (see Figure 4). 2.2. CONVENTIONAL THERMAL GENERATION In conventional power stations, mechanical power is produced by a heat engine that transforms thermal energy, obtained from the combustion of a fuel, into kinetic energy. This kinetic energy is used to drive a generator and produce electricity that can be exported for use elsewhere. Thermal power plants are normally classified by their prime mover (usually a gas or steam turbine, or a combined cycle of both) and their fuel source (e.g. nuclear, fossil fuel, geothermal, biomass). Although there are basic similarities between many variants of conventional generation, and generally their performance is based upon similar characteristics, there are also some important differences which influence their operation, efficiency, flexibility and cost. This section of the paper identifies the key types of conventional generation and their characteristics. Table 1 summarises the main conventional generation plant in Northern Ireland. 2 The term “unit” and “plant” are used interchangeably in this paper; however, strictly speaking a power plant may be made up of multiple generator units. The difference is clarified in Table 1. 3 Abstracts of Conference Papers: TSBE EngD Conference, TSBE Centre, University of Reading, Whiteknights, RG6 6AF, 5th July 2011. http://www.reading.ac.uk/tsbe/ Table 1 - Summary of conventional generation capacity in Northern Ireland Location Plant typei Fuel Units Capacity/unit MSGiii/unit Ballylumford Steam plant Gas 3 180MW 60MW Single shaft CCGT Gas/oil 1+1 100MW (combined) 65MW CCGT/OCGTii Gas/oil 2+1 2x160MW + 2x68MW 180MW +113MW OCGT (quad aero Oil 2 58MW derivative) Coolkeeragh CCGT Gas/oil 1+1 240MW (combined) Kilroot Steam plant Coal/oil 2 220/260MW 110/70MW OCGT (twin aero Oil 2 29MW derivative) OCGT Oil 2 44MW i. CCGT is an acronym for combined cycle gas turbine, OCGT for open cycle gas turbine. ii. Ballylumford’s 2+1 CCGT was designed to operate flexibly with or without the HRSG units. iii. Minimum stable generation (not applicable to OCGT as these only run at peak loads). 2.2.1. STEAM POWER PLANTS In these power plants a steam turbine is used to produce electricity, based upon the thermodynamic Rankine cycle. The basic principle of a subcritical steam plant is shown in Figure 3(a); fuel is combusted in a boiler, the heat is used to turn water into steam, which drives a series of turbines “T”, before the steam is condensed back into water and the cycle is completed by pumping the water back to the boiler. Despite the simplicity of its basic operation, a large number of auxiliary systems are required in order to deliver the fuel, maximise the efficiency of this process and clean up the exhaust emissions. The exact set up of a power plant depends on the nature of the fuel it uses; both in terms of optimisation of design and the equipment required. For example, a pulverised coal3 power plant requires a stockpile
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