Australian National Electricity Market Model - Version 1.10

Abstract

This working paper provides details of the Australian National Electricity Market (ANEM) model version 1.10 used in the research project titled: An investigation of the impacts of increased power supply to the national grid by wind generators on the Australian electricity industry. The paper provides a comprehensive reference of the ANEM model for the other project publications that use the ANEM model to analysis the sensitivity of four factors to increasing wind power penetration. The four factors include (1) transmission line congestion, (2) wholesale spot prices, (3) carbon dioxide emissions and (4) energy dispatch. The sensitivity of the four factors to wind power penetration is considered in conjunction with sensitivity to weather conditions, electricity demand growth and a major augmentation of the transmission grid of the Australian National Electricity Market (NEM) called NEMLink (AEMO 2010a, 2010b, 2011a, 2011b).The sensitivity analyses use 5 levels of wind power penetration from zero wind power penetration to enough wind power to meet the original 2020 41TWh Large-scale Renewable Energy Target. The sensitivity to weather is developed by using half hourly electricity demand profiles by node from three calendar years 2010, 2011 and 2012. The sensitivity to growth is developed by incrementing the nodal demand profiles over the projection years 2014 to 2025.Five inputs of the ANEM model are:(1) Half hourly electricity 'total demand' for 50 nodes in the NEM;(2) Parameter and constraint values for 68 transmission lines and 330 generators, albeit incorporating the de-commissioning of Generation plant occurring over the period 2007-2014;(3) Carbon price, which is assumed zero in this project;(4) Fossil fuel prices; and(5) Network topology of nodes, transmission lines and generators.Five outputs of the ANEM model are:(1) Wholesale spot price at each node (half hourly),(2) Energy generated by each generator (half hourly),(3) Energy dispatched (sent out) by each generator (half hourly),(4) Power flow on each transmission line (half hourly), and(5) Carbon dioxide emissions for each generator (daily).ANEM uses a Direct Current Optimal Power Flow (DC OPF) algorithm to determine optimal dispatch of generation plant, power flows on transmission branches and wholesale prices.