Energy Transition

Economic Dispatch Considering Hourly Capacity Allocation with a Variable Renewable and Hydro-Based Generation Portfolio

Abstract: The objective of this paper is to assess an economic dispatch considering a power system portfolio, which includes predominant amount of hydro power and increasing quantities of intermittent renewables in relation to the total electric capacity. With growing importance of intermittent wind and solar generation taking part into power systems worldwide, there is need for greater chronological resolution to estimate the flexibility of the power system to offer firm capacity.

In this way, a linear optimization model operating hourly is developed to calculate the minimum power system cost, while stablishing the capacity allocation to meet the projected load throughout one-year simulation, as an estimation of how the hourly economic dispatch impacts the scheduling of generators belonging to a power system with this portfolio composition. A central focus is how to operate the available hydro capacity to back up intermittent renewables, evaluating the physical hydro operating constraints, monthly energy balance and maximum power availability.

A case study was simulated based on the Brazil’s power system configuration, showing that existing hydro capacity provide hourly flexibility to back-up intermittent renewables, potentially saving 1.2 Billion R$, about 3.6% of total system cost referred to 2019. It is worthwhile to realize that the developed methodology can be employed to other power systems with similar capacity portfolio structure for the purpose of calculating its optimum allocation for a specified region and target year.

Impacts of wind power on air quality, premature mortality, and exposure disparities in the US

Abstract: Understanding impacts of renewable energy on air quality and associated human exposures is essential for informing future policy. We estimate the impacts of US wind power on air quality and pollution exposure disparities using hourly data from 2011-2017 and detailed atmospheric chemistry modeling.

Wind power associated with Renewable Portfolio Standards (RPS) in 2014 resulted in $2.0 billion in health benefits from improved air quality. 29% and 32% of these health benefits accrued to  racial/ethnic minority and low income populations respectively, below a 2021 target by the Biden administration that 40% of overall benefits of future federal investments flow to disadvantaged communities. Wind power worsened exposure disparities among racial and income groups in some states, but improved them in others.

Health benefits could be up to $8.4 billion if displacement of fossil fuel generators prioritized those with higher health damages. However, strategies that maximize total health benefits would not mitigate pollution disparities, suggesting more targeted measures are needed.

We will assess the threshold cost and performance parameters that fusion technology must deliver to become a substantial contributor to decarbonization at the global scale. This project will determine the parameters for fusion viability and identify which of these parameters are most important for the successful deployment of fusion energy at scale. Even if fusion power is available for deployment in all countries, the expectation is that deployment will be heterogenous due to the availability of other low-carbon energy resources, population density, grid infrastructure, etc.

Global Outlook for Fusion Energy Deployment

The preeminent conference for the advancement of Earth and space sciences, the AGU (American Geophysical Union) Fall Meeting draws more than 25,000 attendees from over 100 countries each year to share research findings and identify innovative solutions to complex problems. Organized around the theme “Science Leads the Future,” this year’s AGU Fall Meeting will take place in Chicago and online on December 12 - 16.

AGU Fall Meeting frames science as engine of a better future
Quantifying the Compounding, Co-Existing Nature and Inequities of Physical and Transition Risks Across the United States

Abstract: Physical and transition risks across socio-environmental systems are becoming increasingly complex, multi-faceted, compounding, and span unjust societal landscapes. Multi-Sector Dynamics (MSD) explores the existence and extent that human and natural systems co-exist, interact, and co-evolve. To meet this need, we have developed an open-science, visualization platform that harmonizes, combines, overlays, and diagnoses landscapes of risks and inequities across socio-economics, human health, biodiversity, demographics, as well as the natural, managed, and built environmental systems. The platform’s current geographic focus allows for an MSD-inspired perspective that resolves combinatory-risk landscapes across the United States at the county level. Combinatory-risk indices from weighted composites of a variety of indicators are created and based on user specifications to areas-of-concern.

As a visual example – we demonstrate where “hotspots” of environmental risks compound. As separate mappings (Figure 1a), current risks to land, water availability and quality, and exposure to poor air quality exhibit features not discernably co-located. The resultant landscape of combinatory risk (Figure 1b) exhibits discernable, prominent “hotspots” across California, the Mississippi River basin, the Southeast, and Mid-Atlantic states. Concurrently, another combined transition-risk mapping indicates that the lower Mississippi River contains the largest portion of fossil energy employment along with high levels of poverty and unemployment. This highlights a potential connection between contrasting regional effects of a low-carbon energy transition. Other examples will demonstrate similar connections and compounding landscapes. Quantitative metrics will show the profound effect the incorporation of socio-demographics has on the “top 5 list” of states that experience the most severe compounding physical and transition risks, and underscore the importance of the choice in these metrics are for the interpretation and assessment of priorities into deep-dive analysis and actions.

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