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Area-based forecasting of power generation from RES

By October 21, 2016December 11th, 2020Energy, R & D, Smart Grid
RES power generation

In September Globema commenced the implementation of another research and development project: “Area forecasting of electricity generation from Renewable Energy Sources including its impact on the loading of network nodes.” The primary objective of the project is to develop an IT system for the forecasting of electricity generation from renewable energy sources (RES) for specific areas with consideration of the increase of the number of energy sources (turbines, photovoltaic panels, etc.) in time and the impact of that generation on the power system. The implementation of the project is the natural extension of our work related to the development and implementation of the 4RES system used for the forecasting of electricity generation from RES for specific locations.

In the last few years, we have been witness to the dynamic growth of RES, primarily wind sources and photovoltaic sources, which, by nature, are strongly dependent on weather conditions. The diversity and number of those sources create new problems in the operation of Transmission Network Operators, Distribution System Operators and Trade Operators. For those companies, it is critical to forecast the generation from RES in various time frames and with different temporal resolutions. Reliable forecasts contribute to the stabilization of the energy market and to the planning of the operation and development of power systems, and they are important to ensuring the safety and stability of the power system. Such forecasts are also useful to the growing segments of prosumers and energy clusters. Since the number of energy sources is very high, and their capacity is relatively low it is not economically viable to use the methods currently used for RES farms with a larger, focused capacity.

The current forecasting methods essentially refer to individual sources and the generation output is predicted based on local forecasts of weather conditions. Such methods are fairly time- and cost-consuming because they require preparation of a predictive model for a single source and because it is necessary to obtain such weather forecasts. That is why a large number of sources (particularly small ones) are not included in the predictions. Based on that observation, we have proposed the development of a system with several innovative features:

  • area-based approach to short-term, medium-term and long-term RES power forecasting
  • preparation of power forecasts with consideration of the continuous development of renewable sources in the individual areas
  • comprehensive inclusion of wind sources and photovoltaic sources to enable generation of forecasts with consideration of the diversified generating structure in the given area
  • option of assigning area forecasts to the units of the 110 kV distribution network and transmission network in order to correctly manage the operation and maintenance of the networks.

The solution to be developed will enable short-term (hourly periods up to 2 days ahead), medium-term (from one month to one year) and long-term (up to dozens of years) forecasting. Under the project, the Globema team, in cooperation with Polish research facilities, will develop methods for the area forecasting of weather conditions affecting the operation of RES and will analyze the variability of the weather conditions based on regional climatic simulations. Additionally, together with the Power Engineering Institute at the Warsaw University of Technology, we will develop new methods for the area forecasting of power generation with consideration of the estimated RES growth. The results will be verified by measurements performed using the measuring instruments (mobile weather stations and sunlight sensors) purchased for the project and measurement results received from Distribution Network Operators.

Project implementation

RES power generation

The project will be implemented at our Software Development Center, with the support of discipline specialists and two research facilities – Interdisciplinary Center for Mathematical and Computational Modeling and the Power Engineering Institute at the Warsaw University of Technology. The industrial research will most likely be conducted in the area of operation of ENEA Operator (Polish DSO). In accordance with the adopted schedule, the project will be implemented in four stages over a period of 34 months, i.e. by the middle of 2019, and the vast majority of the works will involve industrial research.

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