Recipient Organization
NORTH CAROLINA STATE UNIV
(N/A)
RALEIGH,NC 27695
Performing Department
Agricultural and Resource Economics
Non Technical Summary
Generation of electricity from renewable resources, particularly wind and solar, has increased dramatically in the past decade in the U.S. and particularly in North Carolina. This increased penetration of renewable resources has greatly affected the operation of existing fossil-fuel-fired generators and utilities' operations more generally. However, the responseto this increased renewable generation may not be uniform across generators and utilities for a host of reasons. Understanding how existing fossil-fuel-fired plants respond to increasing renewable generation and how that response varies across plants and regions of the country is therefore crucial in understanding the potential benefits and costs of increased renewable generation. The first poart of this reasearch proposal attempts to empirically identify variations in responses to renewable power and then further explain why certain plants are responding the way they are in order to better understand the regional implications of renewable generation.The second part of this research proposal aims to identify how future policies related renewable power generation, as well as adoption of new generation and transmission technologies, will affect the welfare of producers and consumers. To do this, I will use economic principles to develop so-called expansion planning models, which simulate the build of out of the energy infrastructure under a variety of policy, technological, and market scenarios. The model will then be useful in describing tradeoffs amongvarious policy and market design proposals both in North Carolina and nationally.Intellectual Merit:Research under the first theme will use data collected on the operations of individual electricity generating units, as well as data from utilities more broadly, to identify operational impacts associated with increased renewable generation. This will make a contribution to the energy and environmental economics literature by identifying heterogeneity in responses to renewables and further explaining why such heterogeneous responses are found. The second part of the porposal will make contributions to the literature by more accurately incorporating consumers tradeoffs betweenenergy efficiency and energy consumption, combined in an generation expansion and dispatch model. This will allow for a richer analysis of various energy and efficiency policy proposals.Broader Impacts:Together this body of research will make an intellectual contribution to the sustainable energy systems field as a whole, contribute to the training of multi-discplinary undergraduates and graduates, and build collaborative bridges between a number of disciplines, particularly those in environmental engineering, electrical engineering, and economics. Across multiple academic departments at NCSU, this work will also build capacity in the energy systems modeling field.
Animal Health Component
20%
Research Effort Categories
Basic
60%
Applied
20%
Developmental
20%
Goals / Objectives
The general goal of this project is to assess the impact that integrating renewable electricity generation will have on existing generating facilities, electric utilities, and consumers. The specific objectives of the project are:1. Econometrically estimate various generation, environmental, and capital cost impacts associated the increasing deployment of renewable electricity generation assets.2. Develop expansion planning models, inclusive of atheoretically consistent demand sector, to examine how various policies and technological advancements will affect future generation mixes both nationally and in North Carolina.
Project Methods
Given that my appointment is 70% research, the main efforts of this model will use econometric modeling and computer simulation modeling of energy systems. This research will be evaluated on the basis of peer-reviewed academic papers. As teaching makes up the remaining 30% of my appointment, my teaching objectives will be evaluated through mandated teaching evaluations, both by students and peers.