Thermals¶

A thermal cluster is a grouping of plants with close parameters.

Parameters¶

Operating parameters¶

Group¶

string Group in which the cluster is, only for organization purpose.

gas
hard coal
lignite
mixed fuel
nuclear
oil
other 1
other 2
other 3
other 4
other 5

Name¶

string User defined name of the cluster.

Enabled¶

bool Whether to enable this cluster for production.

Must run¶

bool If enabled, the plants will generate at their maximum capacity defined in availability time-serie, regardless of market conditions. Otherwise, above a partial "must-run level" (that may exist or not, see below), plants will be dispatched on the basis of their market bids.

Unit¶

int The number of units in the cluster. Only used to generate time series and to compute the NODU in the outputs. The number of available units in the optimization is derived from the nominal capacity and the availability time series.

Nominal capacity (MW)¶

float The nominal capacity of one unit.

Note

The installed power is the product of the number of units and their nominal capacity. The availability time-serie may exceed the installed power.

Min stable power (MW)¶

float The minimum power to keep a plant on.

Spinning (%)¶

int Default contribution to the spinning reserve, between 0 and 100 (percentage of nominal capacity).

Min uptime (h)¶

int Minimum time a plant must stay on after starting before it can be shut down again.

Min downtime (h)¶

int Minimum time a plant must stay off after stopping before it can be started again.

Operating costs¶

TS cost¶

enum Cost generation

SetManually
useCostTimeseries

Note

If Cost generation is set to SetManually marginal and market bid costs (€/MWh) are specified directly in Time series > Common tab and have the same value for all time series and hours.

If Cost generation is set to useCostTimeseries Marginal and Market bid costs (€/MWh) are calculated separately for all the time series and hours using the following equation:

Marginal_Cost[€/MWh] = Market_Bid_Cost[€/MWh] = (Fuel_Cost[€/GJ] * 3.6 * 100 / Efficiency[%]) + CO2_emission_factor[tons/MWh] * C02_cost[€/tons] + Variable_O&M_cost[€/MWh]

where Efficiency[%], CO2_emission_factor[tons/MWh] and Variable_O&M_cost[€/MWh] are specified in the Common tab under operating costs and parameters, while Fuel_Cost[€/GJ] and C02_cost[€/tons] are provided as time series in separate tabs.

Efficiency (%)¶

int Fuel efficiency. Only used if Cost generation is set to useCostTimeseries.

Variable O&M (€/MWh)¶

float Variable operation and maintenance costs, only used if Cost generation is set to useCostTimeseries.

Marginal cost (€/MWh)¶

float Marginal cost. Only used to compute operating costs in the outputs.

Startup cost (€)¶

float Cost of starting a new plant. Used in the optimization for accurate and milp mode and in the outputs for all modes.

Market bid cost (€/MWh)¶

float Market bid cost. Only used in the optimization for defining operating costs.

Fixed O&M cost (€/h)¶

float Fixed operation and maintenance costs. Used in the optimization for accurate and milp mode and in the outputs for all modes.

Random spread (€/MWh)¶

float Used to define noise on market bid cost in the optimization to avoid equivalent solutions. Even with a null value, a small noise (absolute value between 5e-4 and 6e-4) is applied.

Note

The optimal dispatch plan as well as marginal prices are based on market bids, while the assessment of the operating costs associated with this optimum are based on cost parameters. In standard "perfect" market modeling, there is no difference of approaches because market bids are equal to marginal costs.

Other emission rates¶

The following parameters allow the user to indicate the rates of emission of different polluants for a given cluster. They are not used in the optimization.

CO2 (t/MWh)¶

float Carbon dioxide emission rate.

SO2 (t/MWh)¶

float Sulfur dioxide emission rate.

NH3 (t/MWh)¶

float Ammonia emission rate.

NOx (t/MWh)¶

float Nitrogen oxides emission rate.

NMVOC (t/MWh)¶

float Non-methane volatile organic compounds emission rate.

PM2.5 (t/MWh)¶

float Fine particulate matter (diameter below 2.5 µm) emission rate.

PM5 (t/MWh)¶

float Particulate matter (diameter below 5 µm) emission rate.