Eur. Phys. J. B (2017) 90: 144
https://doi.org/10.1140/epjb/e2017-80200-y

Regular Article

Decompositions of injection patterns for nodal flow allocation in renewable electricity networks

¹ Department of Engineering, Aarhus University, Inge Lehmanns Gade 10, 8000 Aarhus C, Denmark
² Danske Commodities A/S, Vaerkmestergade 3, 8000 Aarhus C, Denmark
³ Frankfurt Institute for Advanced Studies, Ruth-Moufang-Str. 1, 60438 Frankfurt, Germany

^a e-mail: schaefer@eng.au.dk

Received: 4 April 2017
Received in final form: 23 May 2017
Published online: 2 August 2017

Abstract

The large-scale integration of fluctuating renewable power generation represents a challenge to the technical and economical design of a sustainable future electricity system. In this context, the increasing significance of long-range power transmission calls for innovative methods to understand the emerging complex flow patterns and to integrate price signals about the respective infrastructure needs into the energy market design. We introduce a decomposition method of injection patterns. Contrary to standard flow tracing approaches, it provides nodal allocations of link flows and costs in electricity networks by decomposing the network injection pattern into market-inspired elementary import/export building blocks. We apply the new approach to a simplified data-driven model of a European electricity grid with a high share of renewable wind and solar power generation.