Energy storage integration with run of river power plants to mitigate operational environmental constraints: Case study of Sweden

Abstract

Increasing environmental restrictions, create stringent regulations for the use and management of rivers and water bodies, thereby jeopardizing the operational flexibility of hydropower plants. The national plan for new environmental regulations in Sweden is expected to be implemented in 2025. Hence, it is imperative for the hydropower producers to consider alternatives which can overcome the environmental restrictions for providing flexibility. In this paper, a Mixed Integer Linear Programming (MILP) based algorithm for the short-term regulation of hydropower plants with energy storage is proposed. There are two stages of the algorithm: Future electricity market prices model using machine learning techniques, and the combined hydropower plant and battery system (CHBS)’s operation model using MILP. The designed algorithm is used to analyze the techno-economic feasibility of the operation of three hydropower plants Skattungbyn, Unnån and Hansjö, located in lower Oreälven river in Sweden. Three different electricity market scenarios were developed based on Swedish nuclear energy targets for 2040. The forecasted market prices act as inputs for the designed optimization algorithm. The algorithm optimizes the operation of hydropower plants with an objective to maximize revenue through harnessing flexibility enabled by storage. It is observed from the results that with the current battery costs (0.36 million €/MWh), the CHBS for short-term regulation is not profitable with NPV ranging from −1 to −4 million € and the cost of battery needs to be less than 50 000 €/MWh to make it economically feasible.