Purpose -The purpose of this paper is to state a hierarchy methodology to select the most promising innovative projects, based on the processes defined by the successful Project Management Institute. Design/methodology/approach -Open innovation is a new option for companies to acquire knowledge; however, in a changing and global market, it is necessary to define and select properly the proposals to be financially supported. A proven multicriteria decision methodology (MCDM) is recommended in this case to hierarchize altematives. Moreover, analytical hierarchy process (AHP) has been considered in this study as a proven and simple MCDM. Findings -AHP has been demonstrated as a suitable option to evaluate innovative project proposals, thanks to its integration with the Project Management Institute methodology. A process example has been included to demonstrate its application. Research limitations/implications -Innovative projects and project proposal selection have always implied subjective criteria. Moreover, sorne of the processes defined in the methodology were not well defined in the project proposal. Practica! implications -The management of a project portfolio in a rational way would help decision makers to fund the most promising projects/altematives under consideration. In this way, the inherent risk of R&D projects would be minimized. Originality/value -The management of a portfolio of innovative proposals is less often addressed in the literature. This paper focuses on the hybridization of the criteria and processes described in the PMBOK Guide and an MCDM.

The National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) has an interest in advancing the understanding of bulk power wholesale electricity market design issues related to capacity and flexibility in systems that have large amounts of variable generation (VG), mainly wind. NREL commissioned ECCO International, Inc. (ECCO), to study how high penetrations of VG will affect the outcomes of markets and incentives of the various pieces of the wholesale structure (energy, ancillary services, settlements, forward capacity) and what, if any, market design changes can improve incentives to ensure long-term power system reliability and efficiency.This project examined the impact of renewable energy sources, which have zero incremental energy costs, on the sustainability of conventional generation. This "missing money" problem refers to market outcomes in which infra-marginal energy revenues in excess of operations and maintenance (O&M) costs are systematically lower than the amortized costs of new entry for a marginal generator. The problem is caused by two related factors: (1) conventional generation is dispatched less, and (2) the price that conventional generation receives for its energy is lower. This lower revenue stream may not be sufficient to cover both the variable and fixed costs of conventional generation. In fact, this study showed that higher wind penetrations in the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT) system could cause many conventional generators to become uneconomic.For continuity, all generator costs used in this paper were obtained from the 2013 U.S. Energy Information Administration report titled Updated Capital Cost Estimates for Utility Scale Electricity Generating Plants. This ensured consistent data. Also, the current ERCOT fleet was constructed throughout many decades, which makes it difficult to compare capital costs, and therefore these results indicate the costs that could be expected if the ERCOT fleet were replaced with new generators of the same type but using the latest advances and technologies.Two cases were examined: (1) the base case, in which 13% of the energy was met with wind; and (2) the high wind case, in which 30% of the energy was met with wind. An additional 2.2% of the load in the high wind case could have been met with wind, but the energy was curtailed because of network congestion.Generation was impacted by higher wind production in the following ways:• Conventional (nuclear, coal, gas) generation was most negatively impacted.o These units had dramatically reduced energy production, hours on, total revenue, and total profit.o Conventional generation cleared more spinning reserve, but this is because it produced less energy. This was offset, however, by the large spinning reserve ancillary service price drop in the high wind case, from $8.71/MWh to $4.33/MWh.• Overall system-wide generator fixed costs increased, because additional wind generators were being built and maintained. o Overall fixed O&M costs rose from $2.4 billion to $3.2 billion. v This report is available at no...