Comparison among Three Groups of Solar Thermal Power Stations by Data Envelopment Analysis
Toshiyuki Sueyoshi and
Mika Goto
Additional contact information
Toshiyuki Sueyoshi: New Mexico Institute of Mining & Technology, Department of Management, 801 Leroy Place, Socorro, NM 87801, USA
Mika Goto: Tokyo Institute of Technology, School of Environment and Society, 3-3-6 Shibaura, Minato-ku, Tokyo 108-0023, Japan
Energies, 2019, vol. 12, issue 13, 1-20
Abstract:
To change an increasing trend of energy consumption, many counties have turned to solar thermal energy as a solution. Without greenhouse gas emissions, solar thermal power stations may play a vital role in the energy industry because they have a potential to produce electricity for 24 h per day. The goal of this study is to select solar thermal power stations from three regions (i.e., the United States, Spain and the other nations) throughout the world and to identify which region most efficiently produces solar thermal power energy. To measure their efficiencies, we use data envelopment analysis as a method to examine the performance of these power stations. Our empirical results show that the United States currently fields the most efficient solar thermal power stations. This study also finds that parabolic trough technology slightly outperforms the other two technologies (i.e., heliostat power tower and linear Fresnel reflector), but not at the level of statistical significance. In addition to the proposed efficiency assessment, we incorporate a new way of finding a possible existence of congestion. The phenomenon of congestion is separated into output-based and input-based occurrences. Output-based congestion implies a capacity limit (e.g., difficulties in transmission, voltage control and dispatch scheduling) in a grid network between generation and end users. Input-based congestion occurs when generators use “uncontrollable inputs” (e.g., sunlight hours). Renewable energy sources, such as solar thermal power, are indeed important for our future sustainability. However, this needs performance assessment on generation and transmission through which electricity generated by renewable energy is conveyed to end users. Such a holistic assessment, including both efficiency measurement and congestion identification, serves as a major component in evaluating and planning renewable energy generation.
Keywords: solar thermal power; congestion; electricity; data envelopment analysis (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q Q0 Q4 Q40 Q41 Q42 Q43 Q47 Q48 Q49 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (5)
Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/12/13/2454/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1996-1073/12/13/2454/ (text/html)
Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.
Export reference: BibTeX
RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan)
HTML/Text
Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jeners:v:12:y:2019:i:13:p:2454-:d:242930
Access Statistics for this article
Energies is currently edited by Ms. Agatha Cao
More articles in Energies from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager (indexing@mdpi.com).