News | Headlines
Potential reliability concern for central USA
USA System reliability The US Energy Information Administration reports that higher electricity demand forecasts and potential supply reductions are raising concerns about tight, and potentially inadequate, reserve margins in the Midcontinent Independent System Operator (MISO) balancing authority this summer. Working in conjunction with regional utility service providers, balancing authorities are responsible for ensuring that wholesale electric power markets provide sufficient electric generation capacity to meet consumer demand, both in real time and over several years. To ensure reliability, balancing authorities plan for more supply than demand, resulting in a reserve margin, a metric tracked closely by balancing authorities and reliability planners. MISO, as the balancing authority spanning 15 states in the central United States, conducts seasonal assessments for market participants and stakeholders to help ensure the reliable operation of its member utilities’ service area. The North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) compiled expectations of summer supply and demand conditions in its 2022 Summer Reliability Assessment, including reserve margins for grid regions. NERC publishes seasonal reliability assessments for the United States and Canada each summer and winter. MISO’s anticipated reserve margin this summer is 21.1%, but a combination of higher-than-forecast demand or lower-than- expected supply availability could reduce that margin, leading to reliability concerns. To anticipate electricity demand, MISO produces a range of forecasts, including a forecast of average yearly demand and a
forecast of extreme conditions that would occur only once in 10 years. Based on these assumptions, MISO expects that hourly electricity demand could reach 118.2 GW in normal conditions and 125.2 GW in extreme conditions. These values assume that the available demand response measures to reduce electricity demand have already been deployed. On the supply side, MISO expects to have 143.2 GW of available capacity this summer. However, planned maintenance and forced outages could reduce the available capacity. In the past five years, MISO has had an average of 6.7 GW of maintenance outages and 14.4 GW of forced outages in the summer.
Seasonal derates, which include factors such as drought, low-wind conditions, or fuel supply limitations, have further reduced MISO’s summer electricity supply by as much as 9.6 GW in the past five years. To counter some of these outages and derates, MISO has identified 2.4 GW of capacity it can call on during emergency conditions, labelled ‘operational mitigations’ in the NERC report. Accounting for these reductions and mitigations, MISO’s anticipated resources could total 114.9 GW, less than the normal demand expectation. Concerns about long-run capacity shortfalls have prompted MISO to outline measures it will take in response to changes in the electric generator fleet, extreme weather events, and other challenges. In addition, MISO holds forward capacity auctions to provide revenue to generators that commit to being available in future periods. The most recent showed a risk of insufficient capacity in most regions owing to the continued retirement of electric generating capacity.
UK to promote floating wind technology UK Wind power
RenewableUK has initiated the launch of a new body, the Floating Offshore Wind Task Force. Its aim is to ensure that the UK stays at the forefront of the technology.
RenewableUK and the Offshore Renewable Energy Catapult have worked with the UK, Scottish and Welsh governments to set up the Task Force. It will include leading companies such as SSE, Equinor, and Aker, that are already operating and developing floating projects around the UK, as well as senior representatives from the UK and devolved governments and key stakeholder organisations such as The Crown Estate. The UK has at present two projects generating successfully in Scottish waters, Hywind and Kincardine, and the largest pipeline anywhere, 26 GW, of floating wind projects. The Task Force’s plan is to ensure the UK maximises the technological and financial benefits of this burgeoning industry. The initial remit of the Task Force will be to define the scale of opportunity, and produce a comprehensive report on how to make the most of it. The first stage will analyse how fast new capacity can be built in UK waters and quantify the potential investment needed in UK ports and infrastructure to meet this demand. This will be followed by a more detailed series of recommendations next spring.
RenewableUK’s CEO Dan McGrail commented: “The Task Force will lay the groundwork … which will … provide clarity on the strategic investments the UK needs to scale up and deliver a whole new industry … [we] have the potential to make floating wind a century-defining industrial success story for the UK”.
RWE to acquire Magnum plant from Vattenfall
The Netherlands Mergers & acquisitions RWE is to acquire from Vattenfall the 1.4 GWe three-unit gas-fired Magnum combined cycle plant at Eemshaven in the Netherlands. Magnum is located in the immediate vicinity of RWE’s existing 1560 MWe Eemshaven hard coal/biomass power plant. RWE expects comprehensive benefits from sharing local infrastructure. Originally, the Magnum design envisaged a multi-fuel plant
running on syngas (from coal gasification) and/or natural gas, employing diffusion burners. In mid 2007, owing to the cost of gasification, it was decided to initially build a combined cycle plant firing natural gas in DLN burners. The FID was taken in December 2007. The plant, with 3 x M701F gas turbines, was designed to be syngas-ready, with the idea that a coal gasification plant could be constructed at some point in the future. In 2015 feasibility studies were conducted on using hydrogen and ammonia in the plant. The coal gasification plan was finally dropped around this time. Since then, further detailed studies have been done on using hydrogen at Magnum. The current options include: 100% H2
with diffusion burners; 30 vol% H2 firing with the existing DLN burners,
suitably modified; adoption of advanced DLN burners capable of 100% H2 firing; and retrofit of Thomassen/PSM FlameSheet technology.
Conversion of Magnum supports expansion of the H2 infrastructure
in the province of Groningen, in which RWE is already actively involved through the ‘Eemshydrogen’ project cluster, which includes innovative plans for the production of hydrogen. As part of the tender for the Hollandse Kust West VII offshore wind farm, RWE also plans to build electrolysers with a total capacity of 600 MW. This would sustainably develop the province of Groningen into one of the focal points of the Dutch hydrogen economy. The close vicinity to the Dutch North Sea and the surrounding
former natural gas fields also make it possible for Magnum and RWE’s Eemshaven power plant to use CCS technologies in the future. This would allow the Eemshaven site to be operated as not just CO2
neutral, but with negative CO2 firing
emissions. RWE hopes to get
the required government support to make this technically, politically and economically feasible.
8 | June 2022 |
www.modernpowersystems.com
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47
