IUGLS Plan Formulation Workshop, Jan 13, 2010

Topics  Prices  Peaking and ponding model and assumptions  Existing plan results  Hydroplan goes bust  Next steps and recommendations

Prices  Preliminary SVM prices  Prices based on hourly Ontario market data,  Draft report from Synapse gives many options  2025, 2030, 2035, 2040  With or without projected CO2 Price  Peak/Off-Peak pattern  Broken out for each plant/location

Prices Synapse, 2030, No CO2 price

Peaking and Ponding  SVM now has Peaking and Ponding module (worksheets ‘P&P1’ and ‘P&P2’)  Power, energy and $ calculation on P&P sheets replace the old monthly calculations, but those are still there for validation and testing  Takes monthly side channel flow, determines peak and off-peak flow, applies peak and off-peak prices to determine value of energy produced

Assumptions  U.S. Gov’t: No peaking, no ponding  Cloverland  Capacity: 860 cms  Minimum: 90 cms in summer, 305 in winter  Brookfield  Capacity: 1140 cms  Minimum: 250 cms (somewhat arbitrary)  Monthly flow allocation first, then P&P  Assume set number of peaking days per month  5x16 peak period, all other hours are off-peak

How does it work  Calculate how much water is needed for full peaking  If there is enough then  peak flow=capacity  Off peak flow set to maintain monthly allocation  If allocation is not enough, either shorten the peak period to fewer hours or reduce the peak flow (option, I usually assume shorter peak period, but have not tested)  Actual operations are messier and this might overestimate the extent of P&P

Ex: 77A, Feb1902, Hydropower= 1805 cms Countries split flow evenly US Gov’t takes first 405 cms of US share 20 peaking days  320 peak hours, 352 off-peak Monthly = 903 cms Full P&P: 1140 cms for 320 hrs 687 cms for 352 hrs 405 cms Monthly = 498 cms Partial P&P: 860 cms for 233 hrs 305 cms for 439 hrs Side-channel flows from SVM?

Summary of Plans Results Synapse 2030 peak/off-peak prices, No CO2 price

Building Hydropower Plans  Objective: build a plan that targets peak and off- peak flows to chase electricity prices  Basic strategy  Treat peak and off-peak periods separately  Try to release capacity during peak periods  Release more if Superior is really high, less if really low  Adjust off-peak based on lake level  Monthly release is the weighted average of the two  Initial work seemed promising but there were mistakes

The Rule Curves  HydroPlan categorizes Superior level based on relation to PP monthly percentiles 1. Very high (above 80 th percentile) 2. High (60 th to 80 th percentile) 3. Average (40 th to 60 th percentile) 4. Low (20 th to 40 th percentile) 5. Very Low (below 20 th percentile)

The Rule Curve  HydroPlan v1.0 set a year type each December based on the December Lake Superior Level 1. Very high (above 80 th percentile) – release PP flows 2. High (60 th to 80 th percentile) –release hydro capacity 3. Average (40 th to 60 th percentile) – Peak and Pond 4. Low (20 th to 40 th percentile) –Peak and Pond when prices are high 5. Very Low (below 20 th percentile) – Peak and Pond when prices are high

Lesson #1  Assumed we could target pretty low off-peak flow, around 900 cms  Results in monthly flow of about 1620 cms  Because of allocation rules, this limits peaking and ponding at Cloverland  Minimum flows for full peaking:  Winter ~ 2070 cms  Summer – 1840 cms  Or should we question the allocation rules?

HydroPlan results  They’re bad

Let’s look at two decent plans: Bal3 and PreProject Using Synapse prices without CO2 Price …with CO2 price

The Key is “Spill” (flow in excess of plant capacity)

Conclusions  Key values for full peaking  Winter 2070 cmsSummer  1840 cms  Try to release at least those amounts as often as possible  Try to avoid more than about 2450 cms  Forecasting may be important to decide when to increase above 2070/1840 (this is essentially increasing off-peak flow) to avoid high Superior levels