Northwest Power and ConservationCouncil

Oversupply Issue and Challenges

Ken Dragoon

August 31, 2011

Northwest Power and ConservationCouncil

Issue Definition

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• Minimum generation levels on the Northwest power system can at

times exceed the ability to market the power.

• Negative market prices are an indicator of market saturation.

• Limiting factors acting to contribute to minimum generation requirements

include:

• Total Dissolved Gas (TDG) caps on the hydro system, limit hydro system ability to

spill energy.

• Costs incurred by thermal units associated with displacement.

• Cogeneration facilities.

• Increasing levels of low, or negative, variable cost resources– principally wind

generation.

• Factors affecting power marketability:

• Load growth rates and depressed economy.

• Transmission limits and outages.

Northwest Power and ConservationCouncil

Challenges

3

• Events are relatively infrequent, likely lasting days or weeks,

and mainly during light load hours.

• Not likely to occur every year.

• Very limited amounts of energy on average annual basis.

• Spring 2011 event was on the order of 100,000 MWh in a relatively

extreme runoff year.

• Although energy content may be modest, the power

intensity can be very high– in the range of thousands of

megawatts.

Northwest Power and ConservationCouncil

Solution Set Implications

4

• Stand-alone solutions cannot be heavily capital intensive, despite the high power intensity of events.– Cost of load banks is likely end point for

comparisons at ~$20-40/kW.

• Solutions likely to involve pairings with other uses or objectives to cost share with other purposes.

Northwest Power and ConservationCouncil

5

Proposed Timeline

Establish Technical Oversight Committee (TOC) July 2011

TOC Brainstorming meeting July 2011

Categorize proposed solutions July 2011

Establish category workgroups August 2011

Category workgroup meetings August - October 2011

Workgroup Report to TOC November 2011

TOC recommendations for in-depth analysis November 2011

Analysis of Proposed Solutions (by subgroups/contractors) December 2011 - June 2012

Reports to TOC June 2012

TOC Summary Report to Wind Integration Forum Steering Committee

August 2012