Browsing by Subject "Energy Mix"
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Item Open Access ANALYZING THE IMPACT OF NUCLEAR RETIREMENT ON CARBON EMISSIONS(2019-04-25) Li, Qinling; Wang, Mengdi; Gu, YaofengDecreased economic competitiveness and increased safety concerns of nuclear power plants with the introduction of renewable energy have led to decisions to retire nuclear plants earlier than licensed. Though not renewable, nuclear power enjoys the advantage of low-carbon emission and early retirement of nuclear power may exacerbate the existing environmental crisis. The knowledge of retirement impact in terms of emissions informs the planning of decision-makers and provides accessible knowledge to the public. The study explores the impact on carbon emission with both a multivariate linear regression model and a comprehensive energy model under different future scenarios of natural gas prices and retirement rates. Differences in the systems are calculated as changes in total system cost and emissions. Results indicate that early retirements lead to variations in cost and emission with specific respective to scenarios, but the differences are minuscule in scale compared with the business-as-usual scenario.Item Open Access New England's Installed Electric Generation Forecast 2013-2025(2014-04-24) DeMarco, Elizabeth; Osteen, C. Alex; Song, Jiayin; Wang, YuanThe aim of this Master’s Project, as identified by our client the C Three Group, LLC, was to forecast installed electric capacity in the ISO New England region through the year 2025 under different scenarios including varying natural gas prices and RPS programs. ISO New England is the Independent System Operator of New England and oversees electric generation and transmission in the New England States. Our team built a basic supply model and, using linear optimization, we estimated ways for the ISO New England region to expand its supply to meet the growth in forecast demand. We ran our model under different scenarios, including varying natural gas prices and RPS programs. We took into account announced changes to capacity as well as possible scenarios that may affect further changes in the makeup of capacity. The final results showed continued expansion of natural gas and wind generation, the low-cost leaders, as well as new development of demand response. As we varied the future prices of natural gas, more electricity began to be imported from Canada. We believe that future carbon prices and stricter RPS standards may further ratchet up imports and renewables, in place of natural gas. Finally, our model predicts possible future coal retirements and is doubtful of new nuclear. Our client will potentially use the explanation of our models and written report of our findings in future research and consulting for their business.