NEW ENGLAND GRID REPORT ARGUES FOR DISPATCHABLE POWER

By Christian Roselund

On 29 July, New England’s grid operator published a report examining how the region’s grid can maintain reliability under the combination of increasing penetrations of renewable energy and the electrification of heating and transportation required to meet state decarbonization policies. The report found a need to maintain a high level of dispatchable resources, either from within the region or as the result of an active trade with New York and Canada, as well as expanded transmission. It also found that a need for additional studies using more advanced tools than the software ISO New England has used to date.

The Phase 1 Future Grid Reliability Study includes a modeling of scenarios where state goals to decarbonize the electricity sector are met, as well as one that includes high levels of electrification of heating and transportation. It found that the electrification of heating and transportation will “radically change the demand for electric power” in the region. In both scenarios the season of highest reliability concern is winter, due to a reliance on wind resources to meet demand and the high degree of variability of wind output on a week-to-week basis.

ISO New England’s main solution to the challenge of maintaining system reliability is to keep high levels of dispatchable power. In practice this means not retiring the region’s natural gas and oil-fired power plants, even as more wind and solar comes online, and potentially replacing the fuel for these generators with “another low-emission fuel source.” Despite plans by utilities in California and other parts of the United States to deploy hydrogen-burning power plants, the report did not mention hydrogen as a potential solution.

The Future Grid Reliability Study also looked at scenarios with increased two-way electrical interconnections to Quebec. Referencing a 2020 MIT study, it finds that “long-duration storage” utilizing Quebec hydropower could provide energy in place of natural gas during times of peak demand, as well as reducing curtailment of renewable energy sources.

However, the last two efforts to build additional transmission corridors from Quebec have been challenged in New Hampshire and Maine. New Hampshire stopped the Northern Pass project in 2018. The Northeast Clean Energy Connect line was initially rejected in a non-binding statewide vote, was recently approved by the state’s Board of Environmental Protection, and remains the subject of active litigation. The last transmission line connecting Quebec to New England was built in in 1990 and it is unclear if a compromise can be reached with the northern states on a suitable route.

Additionally, the study looked at the possibility of vehicle-to-grid storage using 8 million electric vehicles located throughout New England, finding that this would reduce renewable energy curtailment and displace fossil fuel generation.

However, for both balancing wind and solar with Canadian hydro and mass vehicle-to-grid storage, the study found “difficulties in modeling energy storage using current production cost modeling software.” Even when studying battery storage, there were challenges. The report noted that current software tends to optimize the profit of energy storage resources over short time periods, incorrectly assuming that this aligns with the needs of the system.

ISO New England is continuing to study these challenges, including through an economic planning study currently underway, and a future phase 2 of the Future Grid Reliability Study.

Source: 2021 Economic Study: Future Grid Reliability Study Phase 1 (ISO New England)