End-year China wind power installation rush reduces electric system reliability

Jianglong Li and Mun Ho

Energy Economics, 2024, vol. 133, issue C

Abstract: The urgent challenge posed by climate change has catalyzed global efforts to transition towards sustainable energy sources, with wind power emerging as a pivotal component. However, the rapid expansion of renewable energy sources has raised concerns about electric system reliability, given their intermittent and hard-to-forecast nature. China has provided incentives that promoted the rapid expansion of wind. However, the structure of some incentives led to the phenomenon of end-year rushes to install wind power before incentives expire. Leveraging panel data from China's provinces, we empirically estimate the impact of these installation rushes on electric reliability. We find significant adverse effects, with a one-standard-deviation increase in installation rush corresponding to a 0.767% decrease in the reliability rate and a 39.6-min increase in annual outage duration. Notably, urban areas and the northwestern grid are particularly vulnerable to the disruptions caused by year-end installation rushes. In the urban areas of the northwestern grid, we identify the potential for substantial improvements in the lower bound of the reliability rate, from 98.86% to 99.37%, or a reduction in outage duration from 11.65 h to 7.16 h. These findings show the importance of structuring incentives properly and the importance of improvements in grid infrastructure and management in the transition to a low-carbon world.

Keywords: End-year installation rush; Electric reliability; Wind power; China (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0140988324002159
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

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:eee:eneeco:v:133:y:2024:i:c:s0140988324002159

DOI: 10.1016/j.eneco.2024.107507

Access Statistics for this article

Energy Economics is currently edited by R. S. J. Tol, Beng Ang, Lance Bachmeier, Perry Sadorsky, Ugur Soytas and J. P. Weyant

More articles in Energy Economics from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().