Reliability in Multi-regional Power Systems: Capacity Adequacy and the Role of Interconnectors

Simeon Hagspiel, Andreas Knaut and Jakob Peter

Motivated by the EU Commission´s requirement for member states to account for cross-border trade within capacity mechanisms, this work analyzes the contribution to reliability of interconnectors and variable renewable energies. The paper finds that with regional cooperation, firm generation capacity requirements can be substantially reduced.

Calibrating our model with a comprehensive dataset for Europe, we find that there are substantial benefits from regional cooperation. The amount of firm generation capacity to meet a perfectly reliable system could be reduced by 36.2 GW (i.e., 6.4 %) compared to an isolated regional approach, which translates to savings of 14.5 Bn Euro when being valued with typical investment costs of an open-cycle gas turbine.

Figure: Capacity value of wind power in Germany as a function of installed capacity.

For further information, please see the article by Hagspiel, S., A. Knaut, and J. Peter: Reliability in multi-regional power systems - Capacity adequacy and the role of interconnectors, The Energy Journal, doi: https://doi.org/10.5547/01956574.39.5.shag

or the working paper under http://www.ewi.uni-koeln.de/fileadmin/user_upload/Publikationen/Working_Paper/EWI_WP_17-07_Reliability_in_multi-regional_power_systems_update2018.pdf