We need integrated resilient smart grids that can accommodate the rapid growth of intermittent renewables as well as the rise of “prosumers” who both buy and sell electricity into the grid. This is the focus of three online discussion sessions on February 8th, 9th and 10th organised and hosted by power management company Eaton. The proliferation of multiple generation sources (solar, wind, batteries and other clean, flexible technologies) means … [Read more...]
What do German households pay for power? Costs, surcharges, taxes, grid fees
Power prices in Germany are among the highest in Europe. Though the high costs are in large part due to the mandatory support for renewable energy sources, most customers continue to support the country's energy transition. That might be because German households only pay a little over 9% of their average monthly income on energy, similar to France and the Netherlands. In contrast, Bulgarian households spend more than 25% percent on electricity, … [Read more...]
Using ENTSO-E’s modelling for China’s grid expansion
The EU and China have similar challenges when expanding their complex grid network. Both have large populations and multiple borders (China has 23 provinces, five autonomous regions, four municipalities and two administrative regions). Both must rapidly add clean power whilst ensuring energy security at the lowest cost. Helen Farrell at ECECP describes their project to use European ENTSO-E modelling tools to assess scenarios for China. One key … [Read more...]
New research shows Wind turbines, configured right, could provide grid stability
Research at NREL, in collaboration with GE, has led to a demonstration of common wind turbines in “grid-forming mode”. They managed to set the grid voltage and frequency, operating without power from the wider electric grid. It opens the door to reducing reliance on conventional sources of stability like coal or gas generators. The well-known weakness of wind is its variability and therefore its need to be supported by traditional baseload … [Read more...]
Industry’s large on-site batteries can profitably help stabilise the grid
Energy-intensive industries that invest in their own large on-site batteries will provide multiple benefits to themselves as well as to grid stability, says a new study by the Joint Institute for Strategic Energy (JISEA) in partnership with NREL and others. It matters because future power systems will need to be highly flexible due to the variability of wind and solar. The study assessed two established energy-intensive industries (chlor-alkali … [Read more...]
Distributed Energy Resources and Smart Grids: an opportunity or a distraction?
Distributed Energy Resources (DERs) are poorly understood by the utilities, explain Doyob Kim and Alyssa Fischer at the IEA. Part of the problem is that new innovations and solutions are coming fast, and policy-makers aren’t creating the incentives and frameworks to make them an imperative. But, done right, the successful integration of DERs into the grid will accelerate electrification, address grid stability, and reduce spending on expensive … [Read more...]
Avoiding renewables bottlenecks needs long term planning of electricity transmission infrastructure
As more renewables are rapidly added to grids, network operators must plan new transmission lines to integrate them immediately, avoiding wasteful bottlenecks. It’s a puzzle that’s getting bigger and more complex as the energy transition gains pace, which means transmission policy and planning must improve, and fast. Rather than making lots of small incremental steps, planning ahead will prove less costly and capture efficiencies and economies of … [Read more...]
Electricity Market Reform: ACER must empower consumers, not just network operators
ACER, the EU Agency for the Cooperation of Energy Regulators, has delivered to the EC its preliminary assessment of Europe's high energy prices and the current wholesale electricity market design. Simon Skillings and Lisa Fischer at E3G interpret ACER’s assessment as showing it wants to maintain the status quo. However, long-term changes in market design are inevitable. The authors want ACER to accept this reality and ensure the changes are … [Read more...]
Compact voltage converters for integrating new DERs into the grid
The switches and converters needed to plug new clean energy technologies into the grid are going to be needed soon. The cheaper and smaller they are, the easier it will be to cope with the wide range of solutions coming down the pipe. NREL and its partners are building a megawatt-scale prototype converter that could fit the bill. They will be 1/5th the size and 1/10th the weight of existing alternatives: small enough to place almost anywhere. … [Read more...]
Ice for storage for intermittent renewables, then for cooling
Cooling accounts for around a fifth of total energy consumption in buildings. All those air conditioners and electric fans make up a tenth of all global electricity consumption. Demand will keep rising as developing nations get wealthier. Andrea Willige, writing for the World Economic Forum, looks at ice as a seemingly simple solution. Ice can be used as an energy store like a battery, to balance the grid. Create it when energy is cheap (at … [Read more...]
Can full-scale Distributed Solar really save $473bn in grid investments?
A giant model of the entire US electricity sector which captures distributed energy resource (DER) potential has been getting a lot of attention. It estimates that distributed solar and storage can save $473bn in system-wide costs when deployed at scale (enough to power more than 25% of US homes). Rooftop solar is definitely much more expensive than grid generation, but its location (on your own roof) avoids a range of costly transmission and … [Read more...]
We’re not costing energy correctly: reward clean energy optimisation, not maximum generation
Laura Sandys at Energy Systems Catapult says policy makers today are too focussed on rewarding clean energy generation, in other words supplying as much energy as possible. With that comes a focus on reducing the cost of the energy generated. But how about reducing demand? Demand optimisation should be equally rewarded: efficiency, non-generation demand management (even at the household level: think EVs and heat pumps), and any assets that … [Read more...]
Financial incentives for Grid Modernisation: the problem with guaranteed returns on investment
Grid modernisation is going to be very expensive. What’s the best way to pay for it? The financial incentives governments put in place now will determine what investments get made, how cost-effectively it’s done, and who ultimately pays. Meredith Fowlie at UC Berkeley’s Energy Institute at Haas explains that a common method is for a government to give some sort of guaranteed return on investment for the new asset. But it’s far from ideal. … [Read more...]
Germany: will the end of feed-in tariffs mean the end of citizens-as-energy-producers
Germany’s feed-in tariffs ran for 20 years. The guaranteed electricity price and connection to the grid incentivised ordinary citizens and communities to invest in smaller scale solar, biomass and wind generation for their homes and local areas. But that guaranteed price is now too expensive, and so the tariffs are ending and lowest-bid auctions are taking over. It’s the bigger players who are winning those auctions, and some of the existing … [Read more...]
How Clean Energy Standards have driven clean electrification in the U.S.
John Rogers at the Union of Concerned Scientists presents evidence from the U.S. of the effectiveness of using standards to drive clean electrification. In principle it’s simple: set a legal requirement for the percentage of clean electricity. How it’s done depends on the efforts of all the actors affected. 30 states are using different versions of Clean Energy Standards (CES) – the first began in 1983 and more than half of them began before 2004 … [Read more...]
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