In a future power system powered mainly by variable renewable energy (VRE), ensuring a reliable electricity supply during periods of low solar and wind output will be a central challenge. As the revenues of dispatchable technologies are expected to become increasingly volatile, investors may not be willing to invest in sufficient capacity to ensure resource adequacy in all circumstances, including rare scarcity events. To ensure sufficient generation capacity to meet demand at all times, capacity remuneration mechanisms (CRMs) have been increasingly implemented in Europe. This dissertation investigates whether a CRM will be needed and, if so, which mechanism will be most suitable for a decarbonized power system and a power system in transition based in the Netherlands.
This research was conducted within the scope of the Horizon 2020 TradeRES Project - (grant agreement No 864276). [1] The objective of this project was to test innovative electricity market designs that meet society’s needs with a (near) 100% renewable power system. Such market designs should provide efficient incentives for both system operation and long-term investment, with this research focusing primarily on the latter. The project was designed to employ agent-based modeling, as this approach enables the simulation of imperfect markets in which actors operate without perfect information, foresight, or coordination. Agent-based models are particularly well-suited to capture long-term dynamics, allowing agents to adapt their strategies over time in response to evolving market conditions....

Motivated by generation system adequacy concerns, many European countries have introduced capacity remuneration mechanisms (CRMs) to ensure sufficient investments in power generation. However, it is uncertain whether the existing CRMs will promote sufficient adequacy and flexibility in a decarbonized power system, where supply and demand will become more weather-dependent. We assess the effectiveness of a centralized capacity market, a strategic reserve, and a decentralized capacity market via capacity subscriptions in a climate-neutral, weather-driven power system. We develop a co-simulation of two agent-based models simulating myopia in both operational and investment decisions. We simulate weather uncertainty by running the model with 40 different weather years. Our results from a case study based on the Netherlands indicate that a strategic reserve may increase electricity price volatility in the long-term. A centralized capacity market is more cost-effective than a strategic reserve, but administratively setting its parameters is prone to over- or underprocurement. Capacity subscription allows consumers to select their desired level of reliability. Results indicate that these decentralized capacity markets may yield a clearer signal for the needed dispatchable capacity and promote demand-side response, but it may be challenging to provide long-term certainty for investors.

Future power systems, in which generation will come almost entirely from variable Renewable Energy Sources (vRES), will be characterized by weather-driven supply and flexible demand. In a simulation of the future Dutch power system, we analyze whether there are sufficient incentives for market-driven investors to provide a sufficient level of security of supply, considering the profit-seeking and myopic behavior of investors. We co-simulate two agent-based models (ABM), one for generation expansion and one for the operational time scale. The results suggest that in a system with a high share of vRES and flexibility, prices will be set predominantly by the demand’s willingness to pay, particularly by the opportunity cost of flexible hydrogen electrolyzers. The demand for electric heating could double the price of electricity in winter, compared to summer, and in years with low vRES could cause shortages. Simulations with stochastic weather profiles increase the year-to-year variability of cost recovery by more than threefold and the year-to-year price variability by more than tenfold compared to a scenario with no weather uncertainty. Dispatchable technologies have the most volatile annual returns due to high scarcity rents during years of low vRES production and diminished returns during years with high vRES production. We conclude that in a highly renewable EOM, investors would not have sufficient incentives to ensure the reliability of the system. If they invested in such a way to ensure that demand could be met in a year with the lowest vRES yield, they would not recover their fixed costs in the majority of years.

Developing innovative electricity market designs to facilitate a sustainable transition to (near) 100% renewable power systems while meeting societal needs is a crucial and actual topic of research. This article presents preliminary key findings from the H2020 European project TradeRES, addressing this critical topic. The project uses agent-based and optimization models to effectively capture the behaviour of different market players, and to analyse the current and future power system energy mixes of selected European case studies with different physical and spatial scales from: i) local energy communities and local energy markets (LEMs); ii) national/regional - the Netherlands, Germany, and Iberia (Portugal and Spain); and iii) pan-European energy markets. The first results on LEMs indicate a substantial economic benefit for participants and enhanced revenue streams for distributed energy resources, able to i) incentivise further decentralised investments; ii) promote the growth of variable renewable energy systems (vRES) and iii) increase flexibility at the local level. The outcomes are sensitive to the tariffs’ structure, while the retail sector competitiveness was identified as a critical parameter affecting its efficiency. For the pan-European and national/regional case studies, the first set of simulations had consistent outcomes, namely, by pointing out current design of energy-only markets to be insufficient to incentivize the high levels of vRES foreseen in Europe. Different support schemes (e.g., fixed market premia, contract for differences) were tested and results suggest they may play a relevant role in effectively covering the cost of vRES in a market environment.

Existing indicators of electricity system adequacy need to be supplemented with economic performance indicators. As power systems are decarbonized, energy storage technologies are being developed and demand is becoming more flexible. Reliability standards need to reflect the price elasticity of these sources of flexibility. During scarcity situations, this increased demand flexibility may prevent outages, but still lead to high electricity prices. If the average electricity price is well above the average cost of power supply, this can be an indication that the system is not adequate, even if the outage rate does not exceed the current reliability standards.