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Record Id 50349
Title A study of electricity and central electricity generation
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Abstract A systems approach has been adopted for the evaluation of energy storage for large scale electricity generation. Fuel cost savings derived from the various functions of electricity storage have been estimated. Other advantages attributable to storage such as capacity credit and increased security of supply have not been dealt with in this analysis. The fuel cost savings associated with central electricity storage are usefully broken down into the following categories; immediate reserve, reserve to cover scheduling and dispatching error, and load-levelling (including the more restricted case of peak lopping). In contrast with previously published work, this study indicates that fuel cost savings due to load-levelling arising from an improved operating regime for plant (in practise a reduction in hot starts and standby use of plant), are most important and outweigh the advantages gained in system performance from shifting load to plant of higher efficiency. In some instances the inefficiencies of the storage device exceed gains from merit order shifting. Annual fuel cost savings of about £M42 per annum (1981 terms) for a plant such as Dinorwig are indicated by the analysis. A simple economic analysis suggests that increased amounts of storage should be installed on the CEGB system, perhaps up to 4 GW at 1981 fuel prices. Real fuel inflation might justify even higher penetrations. The optimum storage capactiy (GWh) for different penetrations is also evaluated. Lastly an analysis of savings resulting from a reduction in transmission and distribution losses provided by distributed storage is presented. Results show that high storage efficiencies are required to realise significant savings. With this proviso, up to about £MlO per annum (in 1981 terms) could be saved.
Organisation SERC
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Language English (EN)
Type Details URI(s) Local file(s) Year
Report RAL Technical Reports RAL-84-045. SERC, 1984. RAL-84-045.pdf 1984