Impact of climate change on backup energy and storage needs in wind-dominated power systems in Europe.

Juliane Weber,Dirk Witthaut,Jan Wohland,Mark Reyers,Joaquim G Pinto,Julia Moemken,Charlotte Hoppe

doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0201457

Abstract

The high temporal variability of wind power generation represents a major challenge for the realization of a sustainable energy supply. Large backup and storage facilities are necessary to secure the supply in periods of low renewable generation, especially in countries with a high share of renewables. We show that strong climate change is likely to impede the system integration of intermittent wind energy. To this end, we analyze the temporal characteristics of wind power generation based on high-resolution climate projections for Europe and uncover a robust increase of backup energy and storage needs in most of Central, Northern and North-Western Europe. This effect can be traced back to an increase of the likelihood for long periods of low wind generation and an increase in the seasonal wind variability.

Highlights

The mitigation of climate change requires a fundamental transformation of our energy system
We study how climate change affects the temporal characteristics of wind power generation and the necessity for backup and storage infrastructures in wind-dominated power systems in individual European countries and for a perfectly interconnected European power system
Backup and storage needs crucially depend on the temporal characteristics of wind power generation, in particular the length of periods with low wind generation and the seasonal variability

Summary

Introduction

The mitigation of climate change requires a fundamental transformation of our energy system. The generation of electric power with fossil fuel-fired power plants is the largest source of carbon dioxide emissions with a share of approximately 35% of the global emissions [1]. These power plants must be replaced by renewable sources such as wind turbines and solar photovoltaics (PV) within at most two decades to meet the 2 ̊C or even the 1.5 ̊C goal of the Paris agreement [2,3,4]. Large storage and backup facilities are needed to guarantee supply

Methods

Results

Conclusion