Climate induced extreme weather events and weather variations will affect both energy demand and energy supply system resilience. The specific potential impact of extreme events on energy systems has been difficult to quantify due to the unpredictability of future weather events. Here we develop a stochastic-robust optimization method to consider both low impact variations and extreme events. Applications of the method to 30 cities in Sweden, by considering 13 climate change scenarios, reveal that uncertainties in renewable energy potential and demand can lead to a significant performance gap (up to 34% for grid integration) brought by future climate variations and a drop in power supply reliability (up to 16%) due to extreme weather events. Appropriate quantification of the climate change impacts will ensure robust operation of the energy systems and enable renewable energy penetration above 30% for a majority of the cities.
2According to the Fifth Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, 1 climate change will most likely accelerate, causing increasingly frequent and strong extreme climate events that make humans, as well as built and natural systems, more vulnerable to those events. Failure to address climate change mitigation and adaptation could lead to disaster and serious short-and long-term issues, 2 including partial or total blackouts due to energy supply disruptions. 3 These consequences could be very costly to cities and urban areas. Currently, 3.5 billion people live in these areas, consuming two-thirds of global primary energy and producing 71% of the directly energy-related global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. By 2050, urban areas are expected to hold more than half of the world's population, which will multiply the costs and impacts. 4 Therefore, the urban sector plays an important role in both climate change adaptation and mitigation. Conserving energy and using renewable energy technologies in these areas will be essential to minimize the carbon footprint of the energy infrastructure. Distributed energy systems that support the integration of renewable energy technologies will support the energy transition in the urban context 5 and play a vital role in climate change mitigation and adaptation.Climate change affects the energy use of urban areas extensively, by influencing energy demand, generation, systems and infrastructure. 6,7 Renewable energy generation can be affected in various ways, too, depending on the renewable source (e.g., wind, hydropower or solar) 8,9 and geographical location. 10 Due to extreme weather events, impacts of climate change on peak electricity demand will reach well beyond simple changes in net annual demand and become more critical due to their influence on system design and power supply. 11,12 For example, Sweden's existing residential building stock may experience an approximate 30% decrease in 20-year average heating demand during 2081-2100 compared to 1991-2010, while during extreme conditions the hourly heating and cooling demand may reach betwe...
