Hydropower and Pumped Storage Hydropower Resource Review and Assessment for Alaska’s Railbelt Transmission System

Leif Bredeson and Phylicia Cicilio ()
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Leif Bredeson: Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science, South Dakota State University, Brookings, SD 57007, USA
Phylicia Cicilio: Alaska Center for Energy and Power, University of Alaska, Fairbanks, AK 99775, USA

Energies, 2023, vol. 16, issue 14, 1-13

Abstract: The Alaska Railbelt transmission system runs from Fairbanks to Anchorage to Homer and supplies 75% of the state’s population with power. In the near future, this system will experience significant increases in load due to electrification of the transportation and heating sectors. To account for this, several state organizations are working towards the creation of an integrated resource plan and reliability standards.This work encompasses the efforts of researching the operations, cost, and locations of desirable hydropower and pumped storage hydropower (PSH) resources in the areas surrounding the Railbelt transmission system. The aspects of conventional hydropower and PSH as well as adjustable-speed and ternary PSH were analyzed. With Alaska’s diverse and rugged landscape, QGIS was utilized to delineate the positions of energy resources within a reasonable distance from the Railbelt. By incorporating Digital Terrain Models and the QGIS processing toolbox, a least cost path analysis was completed to filter out resources within the designated distance of the Railbelt. Applying existing cost models to the data in this work helped to decide the energy resources that would be studied further. The future of this project includes modeling the selected energy sources in the PSS/e Railbelt model to examine their effects on the reliability and stability.

Keywords: hydropower; pumped storage hydro; resource assessment; power system planning (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: 2023
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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