Selection of desirable transmission power mode for the bundled wind-thermal generation systems

Abstract Although the integration of large–scale clean wind power will have a positive impact on the environment deterioration and reduce the fossil fuel depletion, it also creates challenges for power system operations. Considering that some countries, such as China, hold a geographical advantage of adjacent distributions of wind and coal resources, i.e., the windy areas are located/close to the areas with vast coal reserves, one feasible plan of both utilizing the large–scale wind power and alleviating the operation burden of power systems is to build bundled wind–thermal generation systems (BWTGSs). This paper first gives the optimal BWTGSs (investment) planning method, in which the cost changing rules, the candidate scheme formation, and long–term wind–thermal coordinated generation scheduling simulation are introduced. Then based on different compensation purposes or requirements, four transmission power modes, i.e., constant transmission power mode, thermal–generation–smoothed transmission power mode, transmission power mode considering load pattern of receiving system, and sectioned transmission power mode, are proposed. Finally, numerical studies are conducted. Planning results show that the generator schemes, total costs, and clean energy proportions differ when adopting different transmission modes, and the sectioned transmission power mode is the most desirable mode with the lowest total planning cost and the highest clean energy proportion.