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Electricity Transport and Storage

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Economics of Power Systems

Part of the book series: Springer Texts in Business and Economics ((STBE))

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Abstract

This chapter focuses first on electricity transport and the corresponding grids. The basics on electricity networks include a discussion why alternating current (AC) prevails in today’s electricity grids and what the structure and the layers of current electricity networks are. Then the physical concepts describing electricity flows are introduced, notably the laws of Kirchhoff and Ohm. For the analysis of AC power flows, equivalent circuits with their combination of resistors, condensers and inductors are introduced as well as phasors which enable power flow computations using complex numbers and a graphical interpretation of active and reactive power. The full AC power flow equations are presented as well as the linear approximation as so-called DC power flow. Furthermore, key components of electric networks including high-voltage lines (HVAC and HVDC) and flexible AC transmission systems (FACTS) are characterised. Also, the principles of system operation including N-1 security and ancillary services like frequency control with operating reserves are discussed. The second part of the chapter deals with storage, starting with a brief discussion of the basics of operation. Then the main technologies including hydro pump storage plants and batteries are characterised alongside with other potential technologies in future systems such as flywheels, supercapacitors, compressed air energy storage or power-to-gas (PtG) technologies.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    The following calculations are only valid for DC lines (neglecting reactive power). However, they can also serve as rough estimation for AC power lines and can be used for a basic understanding.

  2. 2.

    Contrarily to the “large-scale” power grids, on-board electrical systems in cars, trucks, ships, airplanes, etc. with short transport distances for electrical energy (just inside the vehicle) are in general DC systems at voltage levels between 12 and 48 V. Also, many of the home appliances actually use DC and most renewable installations produce direct current. Therefore, some cost savings might occur if future (distribution) grids are based on DC.

  3. 3.

    The formula is valid for DC networks; however, it is also valid for AC networks under some circumstances, such as no charge storage effects occurring in the nodes and lines.

  4. 4.

    A key property of complex numbers is the equality: \({e}^{j\varphi }=\mathrm{cos}\varphi +j\mathrm{sin}\varphi .\) Note: when inserting \(\varphi =\pi\), Euler’s identity is obtained: \({e}^{j\pi }=-1\). Given that the imaginary unit \(j\) (denoted \(i\) outside the electrical engineering community) is defined through the equation \({j}^{2}=-1\), this is also consistent with \({e}^{j\frac{\pi }{2}}=j\).

  5. 5.

    Note that for AC voltage and current, the magnitude (“effective value”) is related to the amplitude of the corresponding sinus wave (depicted in Fig. 5.3) through a factor \(1/\surd 2\). E.g. for voltage: \(V={V}_{0}/\surd 2\).

  6. 6.

    In electrical engineering, the term shunt is used in general to designate an alternative current path in a circuit—similarly like shunts designate bypasses in surgery. The capacitance here is not an actual electric component but part of the equivalent circuit representation of the electrical line.

  7. 7.

    The term “bus” is employed here in reminiscence of the busbars which are thick conductors in transformer substations connecting different lines.

  8. 8.

    The Newton–Raphson method is an algorithm which approximates the zeroes of a real-valued function with the help of the tangent line (making use of the first derivative). The intercept of the tangent line is used to calculate a new approximation of the zero. The new approximation is again used with the corresponding tangent line of the function to come again with a new tangent line closer to the zero. This iteration is iterated until a termination criterion is reached. In comparison to classical interval nesting for finding the zeroes of a function, the Newton–Raphson methods needs in general less iterations.

  9. 9.

    The power plant dispatch can also be determined in AC power flow models; however, in general, a heuristic approach is necessary to determine the optimal solution.

  10. 10.

    For a 380-kV-overhead line, the resistance R is approximately 0.04 Ω/km and the reactance approximately 0.4 Ω/km.

  11. 11.

    AC models could also be used to determine PDTFs. In that case, a reference power flow pattern is selected first, and then, the AC power flow equations are linearised around that reference point using a Taylor series expansion. This leads to an improved accuracy of the linear approximation compared to the DC approximation.

  12. 12.

    Gas-insulated lines (GIL) allow higher transmission voltages and power ratings. The conductor core is placed in an isolating gas within a metal tube. GILs are applied in switching stations and in urban areas as well as in areas where overhead lines are not usable due to spatial or optical reasons.

  13. 13.

    The capacity of a power line is usually restricted by the thermal capacity limit. A higher temperature of the cable (resulting from thermal losses of power transport in the line) implies an expansion of the conductor cable and thus leads to greater sagging of the cable. Correspondingly, wind conditions and outside temperature have an effect on the possible transport volume of a power line.

  14. 14.

    The disaster at the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Japan was not the kind of “unforeseen” event. Available evidence indicates that a tsunami like the one in March 2011 could happen once every 1000 years or less. No precautions had yet been taken to protect the plant against such an event. The ex ante appraisal of events is hence not always aligned with the objective information available and perceptions may be biased also in view of the necessary investment for having sufficient redundancy.

  15. 15.

    To what extent and how these services may be procured on markets is discussed in Sects. 10.3 and 10.4.

  16. 16.

    This may be derived from the AC power flow Eq. (5.11) under the assumption X ≫ R, which is also used in the linear DC power flow approximation (cf. Sect. 5.1.2.3).

  17. 17.

    In Pérez-Díaz et al. (2015), trends (e.g. the provision of different ancillary services) and challenges (e.g. the development of new scheduling strategies) with regard to the operation of pump storage power plants are presented.

  18. 18.

    This shows that the development of storage technologies for applications in other sectors can have strong effects for applications of storage technologies in the energy sector.

  19. 19.

    Efficient thermal energy storage systems are of utmost importance for CSP as they allow to at least partly decouple electricity production from solar radiation (see Sect. 4.2.3.1).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Duisburg-Essen, Essen, Germany

    Christoph Weber

  2. TU Dresden, Dresden, Germany

    Dominik Möst

  3. Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Karlsruhe, Germany

    Wolf Fichtner

Authors
  1. Christoph Weber
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  2. Dominik Möst
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  3. Wolf Fichtner
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Correspondence to Christoph Weber .

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Weber, C., Möst, D., Fichtner, W. (2022). Electricity Transport and Storage. In: Economics of Power Systems. Springer Texts in Business and Economics. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-97770-2_5

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