Cross-Border Interconnectors in South Asia: Market-Oriented Dispatch and Planning

Abstract

Regional trade in South Asia has progressed well over the last decade to exceed 3 GW in interconnection capacity, connecting India with Bhutan, Bangladesh and Nepal. We present an analysis of the benefits of the next 10.6 GW of interconnection capacity under construction and planning stages across four major corridors connecting five countries, including the proposed HVDC interconnector between India and Sri Lanka. It is important that these interconnectors are assessed not only for long-term benefits as part of a least cost portfolio of investments, but also for short-term, market-based benefits that can be gained from new opportunities for cross border electricity trade (CBET) in India's power exchanges. The Electricity Planning Model (EPM) is developed for analysis of regional markets. A combination of market price driven short-term dispatch analysis and long-term planning optimization (for 2019-2035) is conducted using EPM. The analysis shows a strong economic case for development of a South Asian Regional Electricity Market (SAREM). Conservative estimates of (discounted) benefits exceed $1 billion accrued over only 10-12 years for each of the incumbent four major corridors. The short-term analysis using historic spot prices in the Indian Energy Exchange (IEX) also reveals a strong case with annual benefits in the range of $100-400+m pa for these corridors. The model is made available to system operators and planners in the region and used for building their capacity to develop further assessment and inform policy dialogues.

Hydropower Pricing Options for Cross-Border Electricity Trading in China Based on Bi-Level Optimization

“…With perfect market mechanisms as a guarantee, Europe is making great efforts to develop a unified regional power market [13]. Owing to the late start and relatively backward process of power reform, cooperation between India and Nepal [14], or within the Greater Mekong Subregion [15], all choose bilateral contracts for a reasonable effect. The research on CBET focuses on several aspects: 1) evaluation of benefits, risks, and barriers of CBET [16,17]; 2) the path choice of cooperation, pool-based [18] or bilateral contracts, forward [19], or spot [20]; and 3) model and solution for transaction scale optimization [21] (as discussed herein).…”

“…The electricity purchasing cost optimizations (14) to (20) are convex and linear, and thus can be replaced by its KKT conditions. For any convex problem, these conditions are sufficient for achieving a global maximum.…”

Analyzing Electric Vehicle Load Impact on Power Systems: Modeling Analysis and a Case Study for Maldives

“…Equations 1-8 present the key formulations of the EPM model that are relevant for the present EV analysis. A complete formulation of the model is available in reference [67]. The objective function of the model constitutes NPV of all generation related costs discounted by the discount factor .…”

ACT on RE+FLEX: Accelerating Coal Transition Through Repurposing Coal Plants Into Renewable and Flexibility Centers

“…Data for coal plants, such as capacity, status, date of commissioning, and fuel type, was extracted from the World Electric Power Plants Database of Platts [27]. Cost data of coal plants, such as FOM, VOM, heat rate, and fuel costs, was extracted from the country-level or regional World Bank -Electricity Planning Model (EPM) database, a least-cost power modeling platform developed by the World Bank to simulate economic dispatch at the plant level [31]. This database is collected from the power system planning reports, or directly from the utilities in the selected countries.…”

“…The least-cost planning analysis is conducted to check if one or more of the older coal (and HFO) generating units are likely to be economically retired and yet for the system to build sufficient cleaner/cheaper capacity that meets the operating reserve and reliability standards. We used the Electricity Planning Model [31] developed at the World Bank to assess the optimal capacity expansion and retirement strategy for High and Low demand scenarios for 2019-2035. The model is a state-of the-art planning tool that has been deployed for more than 80 countries.…”