Transmission Line Siting Research Articles

Data-driven optimization for seismic-resilient power network planning

Many regions of the planet are exposed to seismic hazards that can cause devastating consequences on power systems. Due to these systems’ crucial role, the evaluation and planning for their safe and reliable operation are paramount. This paper develops a novel data-driven optimization framework to assess the power network’s seismic resilience and plan cost-effective investments for its enhancement. Under a robust optimization scheme, an earthquake attacker–defender model finds the worst-case realization of random earthquake network contingencies within an uncertainty set defined with a large number of scenarios generated by state-of-the-art engineering methods. Moreover, data-driven stochastic-robust optimization is employed in a two-stage seismic-resilient power network planning model, leveraging multiple seismic sources’ distributional information. Transmission line expansions and siting and sizing of battery energy storage systems are decided in the first stage, while the second stage decides operational variables. Experiments on a 281-node Chilean power system provide insights for seismic-resilient planning and demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed approach.

Collaborative stochastic expansion planning of cyber‐physical system considering extreme scenarios

AbstractIn this paper, a collaborative stochastic expansion planning model of cyber‐physical system (CPS) with resilience constraints is proposed. The model can reduce the coupling risk and enhance the resilience under extreme scenarios, from the perspective of the structural/functional coupling between the physical and cyber systems. The model is to collaboratively optimize expansion transmission line siting, expansion communication fibre siting, and service routing distribution to minimize total investment cost. Constraints are divided into conventional constraints and resilience constraints. In the resilience constraints, the impact of cyber failures on the dispatch strategy is analyzed, and the load shedding in stochastic scenarios is limited to guarantee the resilience of the planning scheme. Particularly, to reach a stable solution for the stochastic planning, a mixed scenario set is proposed based on the probabilistic typhoon model and the complex network theory. Finally, the model is solved by the progressive hedging (PH) algorithm. The case studies of the IEEE RTS‐79 test system demonstrate that, compared with the traditional independent planning model, the model proposed in this paper performs better in limiting load loss and enhancing resilience under extreme scenarios.

Comparing policy conflict on electricity transmission line sitings

Maintaining the quality and reliability of electricity transmission lines is central to effective energy governance. However, transmission line siting is often a contentious policy decision since permitting and constructing lines may involve private and public property, residents and communities, and localized and national concerns. Yet, policy conflict in transmission siting across cases and over time has remained largely understudied. This article derives and tests hypotheses about policy conflict in the context of transmission lines completed or constructed between 2017 and 2018 in the United States. In exploring the full population of transmission lines, we find that a majority exhibit relatively low and moderate levels of conflict and attention rather than high levels. We further examine a subset of six of these cases that represent a range of conflict and attention intensity. We describe variation in the diversity of actors and frames, advocacy coalitions, and the volume of discourse associated with transmission line siting over time. As problems related to energy governance have become more complex, energy siting disputes are likely to remain a fruitful area for research on policy conflict.

Integrated transmission and storage systems investment planning hosting wind power generation: continuous‐time hybrid stochastic/robust optimisation

In this study, a continuous-time hybrid stochastic/robust optimisation is proposed for the integrated investment in transmission lines (TLs) and energy storage systems (ESSs) with high penetration of uncertain wind power generation (WPG) sources from a central planner viewpoint. The main objective of the problem is to achieve a simultaneous expansion of transmission assets, TLs and ESSs, whereas minimising the investment cost while taking the operational aspects of a power system into account to accommodate higher shares of uncertain and intermittent WPGs. However, the integrated expansion planning of joint TL and ESS to integrate WPGs via conventional hourly discrete time model can increase the operation cost and result in a non-optimal sizing and siting of TLs and ESSs, hence, can impose an opposite effect on the favourite. Accordingly, a continuous-time model is proposed to coordinate the expansion planning of both TL and ESS to deal with sub-hourly uncertainty of WPGs. Also, the WPG uncertainty in expansion planning problem is characterised using a hybrid stochastic/robust optimisation framework. Numerical tests are implemented on a modified IEEE RTS 24-bus system and the achieved results confirm the efficiency of the proposed model.

Automatic selection of weights for GIS-based multicriteria decision analysis: site selection of transmission towers as a case study

Transmission line (TL) siting consists of finding suitable land to build transmission towers. This is just one of the numerous complex geographical problems often solved using GIS-based multicriteria decision analysis (MCDA), which is a set of techniques that weight several geographical features to identify suitable locations. This technique is mostly employed using expert knowledge to identify the correct set of weights; thus adding a certain amount of subjectivity to the analysis, meaning that for the same problem if we change the experts involved, we may reach different results.This research is a first attempt to try and solve this issue. We employed a statistical analysis to quantitatively calculate these weights and we tested our method on a case study about transmission line siting in Switzerland. We compared the distances between each sample in our dataset, in this case study these are location of transmission towers, with each geographical feature, e.g. distance from water features. Then we calculate the same distances but for random points, sampled throughout the study area. The reasoning behind this method is that if samples present a distance from a geographic feature statistically different from the random, it means that the feature played an important role in dictating the location of the sample. In this case for instance, high-voltage transmission towers are purposely built as far away as possible from urban areas. Random points are on the contrary by definition sampled without any constraint. Therefore, when comparing the two datasets, we should find that transmission towers have a larger average distance from urban areas than random points. This allows us to determine that this criterion (i.e. distance from urban centers) is important for planning new TL.The results indicate that this method can successfully weight and rank the most important criteria to be considered for an MCDA analysis, in line with weights proposed in the literature. The advantage of the proposed technique is that it completely excludes human factors, thus potentially increasing the social acceptance of the MCDA results.

Political efficacy and familiarity as predictors of attitudes towards electric transmission lines in the United States

Public opposition to the construction (i.e., siting) of new high voltage overhead transmission lines is not a new or isolated phenomenon. Past research has posited a variety of reasons, applied general theories, and has provided empirical evidence to explain public opposition. The existing literature, while clarifying many elements of the issue, does not yet fully explain the complexities underlying this public opposition phenomenon. The current study demonstrated how two overlooked factors, people’s sense of political efficacy and their familiarity (i.e., prior exposure) with transmission lines, explained attitudes of support and opposition to siting new power lines.

Managing Public Disputes: Lessons from the Transmission Line Siting in the United States

Managing Public Disputes: Lessons from the Transmission Line Siting in the United States

Putting pylons into place: a UK case study of public perspectives on the impacts of high voltage overhead transmission lines

The siting of high voltage overhead transmission lines (HVOTLs) is often subject to public opposition where affected communities seek to protect local places. This study explores the perspectives of local citizens affected by a proposed HVOTL to connect new nuclear power at Hinkley Point in Southwest England. A two-day public workshop was held with 38 participants in an affected line-site community, using deliberative focus group methods to explore perceptions of environmental and social impacts, risks, governance arrangements and technology choices. The findings show how potential health effects from electric and magnetic fields (EMF) and visual impacts are perceived to industrialise rural places, disrupt place attachments and provoke local opposition. The findings challenge the ‘not-in-my-back-yard’ assumption that citizens are selfish place-protectionists that lack the technical sophistication necessary to take a strategic viewpoint on transmission system development. They also reveal how decision making under the former UK Infrastructure Planning Commission's (IPC) (and its successor body the Planning Inspectorate) presents a challenge to procedural justice, as front-loaded developer-led consultation practices curtail citizen input to key decisions on alternative technologies (for example, underground or undersea lines). This is likely to exacerbate public mistrust of transmission system operators and provoke further organised protest.

What drives opposition to high-voltage transmission lines?

This paper critically reviews theoretical and empirical research from planning, social psychology, and political science relevant to the siting of high-voltage transmission lines (HVTLs). Siting of new HVTLs is important to reducing the emissions of greenhouse gases from the electricity sector as well as meeting demands for reliable power. We synthesize existing research by developing a meso-level framework that integrates and extends existing individual-level theories to better account for the nested impact of social interactions and institutional variables on siting outcomes. We apply our framework to a HVTL case in California where community based opposition was effective due to the perceived high risk of the project and where trust in institutions was low. Statutory p for using existing right-of-ways, land use attributes, and political lobbying were also important in explaining the HVTL siting outcome.

Power to the People: Why We Need Full Federal Preemption of Electrical Transmission Regulation

State and federal governments have made significant investments in the development and installation of renewable energy technology. However, further increases in renewable power use have been stymied by the continued mismatch between the national interest in connecting consumers with utility-scale wind and solar installations and state and local control over the siting of electrical transmission lines. Because renewable power potential is often located far from consumers, transmission lines must cross multiple jurisdictions whose local interests have tended to prevent or significantly delay development. This Note analyzes that disconnect, reviews academic and legislative proposals to overcome it, and proposes a way for the federal government to preempt the states in order to streamline construction of the needed infrastructure while maintaining consideration of local concerns and advancing the overarching policy goal of shifting the electrical grid towards renewable power.

State regulation: Interstate compacts a policy option to enhance transmission line siting

AbstractSiting electric transmission lines across state borders has long been a challenge for the states, the federal government, and utility transmission companies. Too often, the diverse interests of various stakeholders, combined with the absence of a mechanism capable of bringing different entities together, makes siting interstate electric transmission lines a difficult proposition. The multiyear application review process and separate evaluations by multiple jurisdictions constitutes a growing burden for transmission companies and frustrates state and federal policymakers seeking to move renewable energy and lower‐cost electricity to markets.

Global Prospects for Utility-Scale Solar Power: Toward Spatially Explicit Modeling of Renewable Energy Systems

This paper provides high-resolution estimates of the global potential and cost of utility-scale photovoltaic and concentrating solar power technologies and uses a spatially explicit model to identify deployment patterns that minimize the cost of greenhouse gas abatement. A global simulation is run with the goal of providing 2,000 TWh of solar power (~7% of total consumption) in 2030, taking into account least-cost siting of facilities and transmission lines and the effect of diurnal variation on project profitability and required subsidies. The American southwest, Tibetan Plateau, Sahel, and Middle East are identified as major supply areas. Solar power consumption concentrates in the United States over the next decade, diversifying to Europe and India by the early 2020’s, and focusing in China in the second half of the decade - often relying upon long-distance, high-voltage transmission lines. Cost estimates suggest deployment on this scale is likely to be competitive with other prominent abatement options in the energy sector. Further development of spatially explicit energy models could help guide infrastructure planning and financing strategies both nationally and globally, elucidating a range of important questions related to renewable energy policy.

Discourses of Energy Infrastructure Development: A Q-Method Study of Electricity Transmission Line Siting in the UK

The construction of new electricity-transmission infrastructure is construed in UK energy policy documents as necessary for achieving government targets to increase low-carbon electricity provision to combat climate change and ensure long-term energy security. Siting high-voltage overhead lines and substations is publicly controversial, however, due to their potential environmental, social, and economic impacts. Also controversial are issues of governance, procedural justice, and technological choice in decision making, particularly in light of recent legislative changes to the planning of nationally significant infrastructure projects in the UK. This study uses the Q-method to assess the discourses emerging from stakeholder and local community actor responses to line siting in the context of proposed transmission network upgrades in the southwest of England to support a new nuclear power station at Hinkley Point in Somerset. The analysis reveals three discourses, representing divergent positions on the adequacy of existing procedures to enable community participation, trust in network operators, the kinds of system configurations (centralised versus decentralised) required to meet the challenges of climate change and energy security, and the local impacts of overhead lines. Whilst the profile of how diverse respondents loaded upon each discourse showed expected patterns, the range of positions adopted by local residents support previous studies showing the limits of the ‘NIMBY’ conceptualisation of local protest. Whilst greater information provision and more upstream citizen participation in contexts of transmission line planning is recommended to enhance public trust, the limitations of such an approach in the absence of greater clarity at the national level regarding the configuration of future energy systems is discussed.

Making electricity networks “visible”: Industry actor representations of “publics” and public engagement in infrastructure planning

This interview study with UK electricity distribution and transmission network operators (DNO and TNO) and the regulator Ofgem, examines how key industry actors conceptualise “publics,” “stakeholders” and “customers” and how these conceptualisations subsequently inform their engagement practices with these heterogeneous groups. The results show that regulatory changes to the structure of distribution networks have encouraged greater levels of “stakeholder” involvement. However, DNO regional monopoly powers and the regulatory environment serve to conflate network actors’ representations of “the public” with “customers,” and also “hides” DNO roles in a manner that precludes direct citizen engagement. TNO respondents employ public exhibitions in transmission line siting, although at a stage “downstream” in the decision-making process whereby citizens have little decisional influence. We conclude that network operators adopt the rhetoric of deliberative engagement whilst lacking a clear rationale and effective means to incorporate citizen perspectives in long-term network development or specific infrastructure siting proposals.

Principles for Interregional Transmission Expansion

In aiming to facilitate the siting of interregional transmission lines, some basic principles might include an approach where the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission uses a variety of tools to capture the value of new transmission, and thus increase the supply of interregional lines. There also may be opportunities for the Commission to work with localities to reduce resistance to new lines by means of economic incentives. Such a tack has the potential to be more efficient than fighting local opposition in the courts.

Quantifying siting difficulty: A case study of US transmission line siting

The worldwide demand for new energy infrastructures has been paralleled in recent years by the increasing difficulty of siting major facilities. Siting difficulty is the subject of widespread discussion, but because of the complexity of the problem, potential solutions are not obvious or well understood. This paper presents a two-step policy-level framework that first develops an empirical measure of siting difficulty and then quantitatively assesses its major causes. The approach is based on the creation and aggregation of four siting indicators that are independent of the common causes and localized effects of siting problems. The proposed framework is demonstrated for the case of US transmission line siting. Results of the analyses reveal significant variations in state siting difficulty and industry experts’ perceptions of its dominant causes, with implications for the long-term success of Regional Transmission Organizations (RTOs) and knowledge transfer among siting professionals in the deregulated industry.

Who Should Regulate the Siting of Electric Transmission Lines Anyway? A Jurisdictional Study

The case law addressing the Natural Gas Act's preemption of state and local law regulating the siting of interstate gas pipelines provides important lessons for those seeking to transfer regulatory authority over the siting of interstate electric transmission lines to the federal government. The legislative options range from providing for state and federal concurrent jurisdiction over interstate lines, interstitial regulation by the federal and state governments, involvement and limited participation of state and local governments in a federal proceeding, or the complete preemption of state and local law.

BUSH URGES ENERGY POLICY OVERHAUL

LATE LAST WEEK, PRESIDENT George W. Bush released his Administration's much-discussed national energy plan and formally threw open the starting gate for a national debate over future U.S. energy needs. The President and Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham made the announcement during a tour of midwestern advanced energy facilities. The plan, drawn up by a task force led by Vice President Richard B. Cheney and staffed by former aides to Sen. Frank H. Murkowski (R-Alaska), was crafted during a four-month series of meetings held out of public sight and with heavy reliance on the input of industrial America. The report enjoys support from U.S. businesses, but its heavy emphasis on exploration and production of oil, gas, and coal, as well as greater reliance on nuclear power, has angered environmentalists. Included among the 105 report recommendations are the following: begin drilling in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, ease siting of new electrical transmission lines, re-examine policies that ...

Public perceptions of electric power transmission lines

Electric power transmission lines have recently met a very significant amount of public opposition. The source of such opposition varies from case to case, and is often hard to identify. Stated objections have included land use conflicts, noise created by the lines, aesthetic concerns, and fears of health and safety threats. Despite the sometimes enormous costs and long delays caused by strong opposition to transmission line siting and construction, both utilities and governmental regulators seem baffled at why the public objects so vehemently. At the same time, opponents are often equally baffled at why their objections seem to go unheeded. As a step toward developing satisfactory solutions to the conflict, this article reviews and critiques the literature dealing with attitudes toward electric power transmission lines, and outlines a conceptual framework for understanding the determinants of those attitudes.

Recent State Laws Regulating Power Facility Siting

During the past five years there has been a growing trend in the states to adopt legislation for the siting of power facilities. To date, 25 states have enacted new legislation that provides for regulation of the siting of thermal power plants and transmission lines. Many other states have such requirements under consideration. The most definite trend in recent state laws is the requirement for preconstruction certification for new fossil and nuclear generating plant sites, as well as for transmission line routes. In all the 25 states, environmental protection was mandated as a fundamental policy, requiring environmental issues to be part of the considerations made by the certifying agency. Furthermore, the trend to consolidate the certification process is indicated by the fact that the majority of states, 17 of 25, have a “one-stop licensing” provision for siting power facilities. Consolidating the licensing process increases regulatory effectiveness and decreases licensing delay. Since there is the need for expediting the certification process as well as public interest in protecting environmental values in power facility siting, we can expect more states to enact similar siting and certification laws, regardless of the success of federal activity on power plant siting legislation.