Reliability in Power

Reliability in Power

This is the Fifth episode in this series called ‘Understanding Power’.

This episode’s topic is all about understanding the cost of your utility bills.

This video and blog covers two topics

  1. Reliability in Power
  2. Reliability in Transmission

Relability in Power Generation

on January 13, the Alberta Electrical System Operator (AESO) released two notices, each more serious than the other: The grid was at risk of having province wide blackouts. What caused this? Well, it was two-fold:

  • High Demand: because it was winter and it was extremely cold  (-30C), there was a lot of extra load. In fact, Alberta hit an all time high record that week.
  • Limited Power Generation: Alberta has a large percentage of wind power capacity(shown in pie chart on left below) but the thermal gradients that create wind are limited in very cold weather meaning there was very little wind power being generated (shown in pie chart on right below)

this created the perfect storm where we had an elevated load and an undersupplied grid almost resulted in calamity.

Ensuring Sufficient Power Generation

It is probably very clear that a territory needs to ensure that there is more power generation capacity than there is load, what may not be as straight forward is how the different types of power generation operate throughout the day and respond to load variability.

above is a fictitious example of a typical 24 hour day within an example jurisdiction.  What this chart is aiming to show is how throughout an average day, most grids see dramatic load change with two main spikes: the first in the morning as people get up and get ready for work, and the second at nighttime when people leave work and start cooking.

Our grid power generation mix is made up of 3 main groups: (Get more information on power generation technologies)

  • Baseline power: Power generation capacity that cannot easily be ramped up or ramped down. 
  • Variable Power: Power generation systems that produce power when available such as solar (during sunlight hours) and wind (when the wind blows)
  • ‘Agile’ Power: Power generation systems that can easily be ramped up or ramped down to allow for overall grid load response. 

In the chart shown above, you can see how the baseline power (Nuclear, Hydro and Large thermal) remain relatively consistent throughout the day. Additionally, you will notice how solar comes on during sunlight hours. Though wind appears to be consistent, Wind power is a function of wind and can be unreliable as seen above. Finally you can see how the major load variability is responded to by small and responsive thermal plants which operate using engines and aero derivative turbines. The benefit of these types of systems are that they can be easily turned on, ramped up and then turned off as necessary.

This mix of generation capabilities allows the grid to quickly respond to load changes ensuring reliability of power supply.

Reliability in Transmission

The second part of this topic is about reliability in the transmission systems we employ to transmit power from the point of generation to the eventual location of where the load is, whether that is our house or a facility.

It is straight forward to understand that we need to have adequate power generation for the load of our grid at any given time; but equally, we need to ensure that this transportation infrastructure can supply the amount of power to the locations required. The major portion of our system is the transmission lines, whether that’s the transmission portion, or the distribution portion, the power lines play a huge role in the reliability of our power system.

Transmission Reliability Problem 1: Capacity Overload:

The first thing we need to make sure is that we are never in a scenario where our load exceeds the capacity of our transmission lines. In scenarios where the load of the system exceeds the capacity of the power lines or transformers, we end up in scenario where we will have system wide power failure. Want more information how the transmission system works?

Transmission Reliability Problem 2:

Powerline obstruction

The second scenario that we see a lot with power lines is power lines are highly susceptible to weather: They’re above ground, easily exposed to flying debris, for example, in hurricanes, and also susceptible to easily sparking fires and we’re seeing this happen quite a bit in California these days.

 

 

 

In 2019 act, we actually saw a utility actively choose to turn off their high voltage power lines, because of fears that their lines would cause fires and that resulted in massive power outages and failures within the the Northern California region.

How can we increase reliability in transmission?

 Well, one of the ways that a utility can increase the reliability of the grid, is by generating power closer to the load, and ont he distribution side of the transmission system. This is called distributed generation. By moving the generation closer, the likelihood of line failure between generation and load has been dramatically reduced.

Onsite Power Generation

So let’s say you lose power at your facility and there is no distributed power generation or in fact, the power outage is right outside of your building, how are you going to ensure that you have reliability? this is where standby generation or on site power generation support power reliability.

Below is an example of a backup diesel generator installed at a hospital to provide backup power in the case of grid power failure. Want more information? 

 

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Power Markets

Power Markets

This is the fourth episode in this series called ‘Understanding Power’.

This episode’s topic is all about understanding the cost of your utility bills.

after evaluating your utility bill, it quickly becomes clear that there are two major factors or two primary categories of costs:

  1. Energy Charge.
  2. The cost of the Transmission and Distribution (T&D)

Energy Charge:

The energy charge is effectively the cost cost of energy that is consumed at our facility, house or industrial application

What affects the Energy Charge?

Some of the major factors that play into that into the energy charge are as follows:

  • the types of generation mechanisms within your jurisdiction: Some are cheaper, some are more expensive.
  • The supply and demand curve: do we have a lot of supply and not a whole lot of demand, that will bring price down, if it’s the opposite, you’re going to see prices rise to incentivize power generation increase.
  • Weather, climate, geography: those play a huge role.
  • Regulatory policy

Transmission Charge

Second aspect is the cost of transmission and what are we paying for that. Simply put, we’re paying for the cost of getting those electrons from the centralized generation facilities right through to our final end use customer location, whether that’s your house, office or large industrial facility.

The rates and cost of power transmission does vary depending on the facility and rate that your specific utility charges (or is regulated and allowed to charge)

How does Power Transmission Work?

Most jurisdictions have large centralized generation plants, typically on the transmission side, and large volumes of loads on the distribution side of the system.

Transmission System

As mentioned, in most jurisdictions the majority of power generation is supplied by large centralized systems that uses the transmission system to transfer the load to a large volume of customers spread out geographically.

As such, the transmission system operates at high voltage so that large volumes of power can be transmitted with minimal line loss (Power loss) from the generation systems to the eventual load.

Typically there is minimal load (or customers) on the transmission side but there are rare occasions where facilities tie into the transmission system.

Distribution System

The distribution system operates at reduced voltage allowing safe and reliable transportation of power within urban and city environments. Distribution can range from as high as 26 kV and down to 120V.

The majority of the grid’s load is typically on the distribution system.

Regulated vs De-regulated Power Markets

Some jurisdictions operate their power infrastructure under a regulated style, while some are de-regulated.

So what is a regulated environment?

In a regulated power market, a single entity or organization owns and operates everything. From the generation capacity, to the meter on your house or facility, that single entity oversees everything. So typically, the utility is the monopoly, you really don’t have any choice and the utility sets the rates. You really have no option.

So what is a de-regulated environment?

A de-regulated market is a competitive marketplace, where multiple entities can buy and sell power. So on the on the generation side, you have multiple power generators that are competing to provide power at the cheapest rate, and then on the customer side, you have retailers who are competing for customers by offering the best rates. So what this allows is a customer to have a choice in whom they are going to get power from and that choice can be based on, on cost, sustainability to other specific criteria to that customer; that’s one of the benefits of a deregulated power market.

Centralized vs Decentralized vs Behind-the-fence generation

So one of the last things I want to speak to is the concept of centralized power generation vs distributed power generation vs behind the fence (BTF) generation.

Centralized Power Generation

As mentioned above, most power generation is usually done at large centralized facilities. The economies of scale typically allow this power generation to be cost-effective. Additionally with the ability to be on the transmission side, large volumes of power can be transmitted easily.

Distributed Power Generation

We are starting to see a move to distributed generation, where we’re placing generation closer to the point of load and on the distribution side of the transmissions system. By doing this, we reduce the amount of capital required to transmit power and we increase the reliability and resiliency of the grid

Behind-The-Fence Power Generation

The last is Behind-The-Fence (BTF) generation. We can actually reduce our transmission costs, reduce our utility bill by generating our own power. If you’re a large industrial customer, there’s huge incentives for you to generate your own power.

 

 

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S2:E3 – How is Electricity Generated?

This is the third episode in our series titled ‘Understanding Power’

This episode delves into the different mechanisms and methods for generating electricity.

The first thing we discuss is how kinetic energy is turned into electrical energy using a generator.

This video then goes into the different ways that kinetic energy is converted from other forms of energy, some that are storable and others that are not.

We then delve into renewable power generation technologies and their merits and disadvantages.

Finally this video touches on the topic of curtailment and how excess power, predominantly from renewables, may have to be wasted because it is produced in excess of the load with insufficient storage options.

Feel free to check out other videos like this on our website and sign up on our website for notification of new videos.

 

 

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S2:E2 – Different forms of Energy

Energy comes in different forms and one of the main ways that we use energy is for heat. Whether that is for cooking, or transportation or even power generation (we’ll get into that in episode 3 of this series)

This video compares 4 of the primary energy sources used in our day-to-day:

  • Electricity
  • Natural Gas
  • Diesel
  • Propane

We look at the difference in cost/kWh of energy and the CO2 output of each of these energy sources

We will be posting these weekly so make sure to follow us or sign up for our newsletter to receive notice of when we post them:

https://collicutt.com/ca/contact-us/

 

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S2:E1 – Energy Vs Power

Have you ever wondered how power and energy work?

This series is an introductory and educational series into #UnderstandingPower

Today’s episode is all about Energy vs Power: How are they related and how are they different.

Global Energy Consumption:

Did you know the in 2018 the globe consumed 167,000 TWh. That’s equivalent to almost 100 billion barrels of oil consumption and it would require 144 billion solar panels running 12 hours a day to produce that amount of power.

The global electrical consumption in that same period was 23,000TWh, which is almost 14% of total energy consumption.

 

Here are a couple topics covered within this video:

  • What is Energy?
  • What is Power?
  • How are the two related
  • What are the different units of measurement for each

 

We will be posting these weekly so make sure to follow us or sign up for our newsletter to receive notice of when we post them:

https://collicutt.com/ca/contact-us/

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