Improved modelling of pumped hydro energy storage
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Full Text E-thesis
Date
2012
Authors
Deane, John Paul
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Publisher
University College Cork
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Abstract
Rising greenhouse gas emissions, diminishing fossil fuel reserves and concerns over energy security have led to renewable energy targets that have spurred the growth of variable renewable generation sources such as wind and wave in many countries. The introduction of variable sources of electrical generation makes the operation and modelling of the power system more challenging. Pumped hydro energy storage is a flexible, fast acting generating source with the ability to store large amounts of electricity, and to facilitate the technical integration of variable renewable sources of generation. Recently, there has been resurgence in pumped hydro energy storage as many European countries strive for greater integration of renewables; however, the software tools and techniques used to traditionally model the power system need to be improved in order to capture the operation and role of flexible enabling technologies such as pumped hydro storage. Traditionally deterministic models that simulate the power system at hourly resolution are employed to assess the role and usefulness of pumped hydro storage. In this thesis, techniques are developed and presented to improve the current representation of pumped hydro energy storage, eliminating the weakness of perfect foresight assumption in model simulations. It is also demonstrated that higher temporal resolution simulations of the power system have the ability to capture important aspects of power system operation such as binding ramp rates. New techniques are also put forward for the improved modelling of large pumped storage in the context of wind forecast uncertainty, and it is shown that energy system models can benefit in the modelling of pumped hydro storage by soft-linking with power system models. Overall, this works shows that existing pumped hydro energy storage will play an ever more important role in Ireland as levels of installed wind capacity increase.
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Keywords
Energy storage , Pumped storage power plants
Citation
Deane, J. P. 2012. Improved modelling of pumped hydro energy storage. PhD Thesis, University College Cork.