Publication: Green Transmission: Context, Rationale, and Planning Methodology
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2023-07-18
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2023-07-18
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Transmission is a key enabler of clean generation as the lines and substations need to be built first to encourage investments in generation. However, there has been limited attention to readying the grid through upgrades of existing transmission lines/substations and expansion of the grid. As a result, transmission has become a major bottleneck, not only in developing countries, but also in their developed counterparts, including the United States, which has seen accumulation of 930 gigawatts of clean generation “queued up” waiting for transmission to be built. To prioritize upgrading and expansion of the transmission grid, there is a need to adopt a more holistic systemwide view from a long-term perspective and develop a methodology that recognizes transmission as an enabler of clean generation. Such a methodology can be devised around a composite generation-transmission co-optimization model. This paper sets the context within which “green transmission” needs to be viewed and further proposes a modeling framework that brings together the critical elements in generation and transmission planning, including system security constraints as a mixed-integer linear programming problem. The model formulation attempts to strike a reasonable balance between the technical rigor of a network model and computational tractability. There are also important implementation details such as making the planning period sufficiently long to elicit the value of transmission. The shadow prices of key constraints extracted from the model can be useful in prioritizing transmission projects, especially if the duals of transmission capacity and carbon dioxide limits are combined. These issues are discussed around a set of illustrative examples. It is expected that the model and associated discussion would provide a starting point to refine the model further and apply it to practical case studies to develop a holistic definition of green transmission and sustainable generation-transmission plans.
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“Chattopadhyay, Debabrata; Tabassum, Durreh. 2023. Green Transmission: Context, Rationale, and Planning Methodology. Policy Research Working Papers; 10517. © World Bank. http://hdl.handle.net/10986/40032 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”
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