Debra LewNREL

WestConnect Planning Meeting11-12-08

Western Wind and Solar Integration

Study Update

High Renewables Basecase 2017

Wind Solar PV Concentrating Solar Power

Total

Study footprint (WestConnect)

30% by energy

1.5% 3.5% 35%

28,256 MW 2472 MW 2884 MW 33,613 MW

Rest of WECC 20% 0.9% 2.1% 23%

36,767 MW 2895 MW 3378 MW 43,040 MW

Total 65,023 MW 5368 MW 6262 MW 76,654 MW

Scenarios• “In-area”

– Each transmission area meets 35% of its load from wind and solar sites in that area

• “Mega projects”– Each transmission area meets 35% of its load from wind and solar sites that have the

least cost of delivered energy

• “Local priority”– Similar to Mega projects but with small bonus given to in-area sites

• “High solar”– Similar to Mega projects or Local priority but with ~10% solar penetration

• “High capacity value”– Each transmission area meets 35% of its load from wind and solar sites that are best

correlated with load -have highest capacity value

• “High geographic diversity”– Each transmission area meets 35% of its load from wind and solar sites that are

geographically diverse

Preliminary Analysis

(being revised)

Study area wind penetration by capacity is 137% of min load and 49% of max load

The highest penetration rates are in Southern Nevada with wind as 217% of min load and in Northern Nevada with wind as 66% of max load

April 2006 (being revised)

Net load (load minus wind minus solar) is highly variable with some negative net load for a few hours this month

Oct 8, 2006 (being revised)

Need for Subhourly PV Analysis

Source: Tom Hansen, Tucson Electric Power

Tasks and Schedule• Stakeholder Meeting (5/23/07)• Data Collection (second half ‘07)

– Wind and solar mesoscale modeling (3TIER, SUNY, NREL)– Utility load, generator, transmission data (Exeter)

• Preliminary Analysis (first half ‘08) - GE – Extensive statistical analysis with various options for wind/solar sites and

transmission• Scenario Development (8/08) - GE

– In-state vs out-of-state resources– Geographically diverse resources– Mega projects– Best correlated with load

• Stakeholder Meeting (8/14/08)• Revise statistical analysis and scenarios with new wind data• Run Scenarios (start Jan ‘09) - GE

– Examine costs due to regulation, load following, unit commitment– “Dives” to investigate issues such as Hoover– Examine mitigation strategies/options– Determine contributions to reliability and capacity value

• Stakeholder Meeting – Preliminary Results (Apr/May ‘09)• Stakeholder Meeting and Final Report (Sep/Oct ‘09)

Information

• WWSIS– Website at– http://westconnect.com/init_wwis.php– Western wind dataset at– http://www.nrel.gov/wind/westernwind/

• Contact– Debra Lew– debra_lew@nrel.gov – 303-384-7037