CAREER: Capacity Adequacy Options for Electricity Markets with Increasing Renewable Penetration: Equilibrium Models and Laboratory Experiments

有组织的电力批发市场是将经济原理与电力输送物理相结合的复杂制度。自20世纪90年代以来，这些市场融合成一个共同框架，成功地促进了高效可靠的运营。然而，间歇性可再生能源的发展带来了早期设计中未知或较少材料的挑战。随着电力市场的发展，可再生能源发电逐渐融入电力系统，需要强大的模型和分析工具来帮助决策者进行设计工作。在旨在为设计决策提供信息的模型中，市场复杂性往往没有得到充分体现，电力市场结构之间的比较也很困难。本CAREER提案的研究目标是建立一个统一的概念和计算框架，以比较批发电力市场设计在可再生能源普及率不断提高的情况下为发电能力投资提供有效激励的能力。研究结果将促进对与电力市场设计相关的效率收益的理解，有助于对整合可再生能源的最有效途径提供更清晰的答案，并有助于制定未来的市场设计决策。与区域电力市场的持续合作将促进研究成果的传播和有前景的市场设计创新的实施。本职业建议的教育目标是提供研究机会，吸引PI研究小组的女本科生，鼓励她们追求更高学位的兴趣，并将科学传播训练纳入本科和研究生教育。这些目标与该计划的长期教育目标非常一致，该目标是扩大妇女参与能源经济学和工程学的研究事业，并教育下一代能源学者和专业人员。本研究采用一种结合平衡模型和实验经济方法的独特方法，考察了与可再生能源整合到电力系统中相关的市场设计挑战。首先，PI将开发多阶段均衡模型，以模拟电力市场在资源充足性和收入充足性的替代设计下的投资和运营决策。均衡模型将：i)考虑可再生能源生产、需求和燃料价格的不确定性对投资决策的影响；Ii)跨越多年的时间框架来考虑投资和退休的决定；Iii)纳入发电能力的风险规避投资和能源市场的不完全竞争。本建议中讨论的类型模型的特点是非凸性，这对已建立的解决方案技术提出了挑战。为了处理计算复杂性，PI将利用最近的算法进展来计算不确定条件下非合作博弈的均衡。其次，PI将设计并进行人体实验，以比较市场设计的性能特征。实验室是评估受控条件下的市场结构的理想环境，为收集每种设计的相对优势和劣势的证据提供了机会，并检查了反映自然发生的市场显著特征的经济环境中的人类决策。因此，在设计工作中，实验可以作为平衡模型的有价值的补充。均衡模型的预测将与实验市场的结果进行比较，以提供对现实世界市场设计的见解。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

Organized wholesale electricity markets are complex institutions combining economic principles with the physics of electric delivery. These markets converged to a common framework that has been successful at promoting efficient and reliable operations since the 1990s. However, the growth of intermittent renewables poses challenges that were unknown, or less material, in the early designs. As electricity markets evolve to integrate renewable generation into power systems, there is a need for robust models and analysis tools to help decision-makers in the design effort. Market complexity is often not adequately represented in models aimed at informing design decisions, and comparisons between electricity market structures are difficult. The research objective of this CAREER proposal is to develop a unifying conceptual and computational framework to compare wholesale electricity market designs on their ability to provide efficient incentives for generation capacity investment under increasing renewable penetration. Results will advance understanding of efficiency gains associated with electricity market designs, contribute to sharper answers on the most efficient path forward to integrate renewables, and help shape future market design decisions. Ongoing collaboration with regional electricity markets will facilitate dissemination of research findings and implementation of promising market design innovations. The educational objective of this CAREER proposal is to provide research opportunities that engage female undergraduate students in the PI's research group and encourage their interest in pursuing advanced degrees, and integrate science communication training into undergraduate and graduate education. These objectives are well aligned with the PI's long-term educational goals of broadening participation of women in research careers in energy economics and engineering, and educating the next generation of energy scholars and professionals.The proposed research examines a market design challenge associated with renewable integration into electricity systems, using a unique approach that combines equilibrium models and experimental economic methods. First, the PI will develop multi-stage equilibrium models to simulate investment and operation decisions in electricity markets under alternate designs for resource adequacy and revenue sufficiency. Equilibrium models will: i) account for the impact of uncertainty in renewable production, demand and fuel prices on investment decisions; ii) span a multi-year time frame to consider investment and retirement decisions; iii) incorporate risk-averse investment in generation capacity and imperfect competition in energy markets. Models of the type discussed in this proposal are characterized by non-convexities that pose challenges to established solution techniques. To handle computational complexity, the PI will leverage recent algorithmic advances for computing equilibria of non-cooperative games under uncertainty. Second, the PI will design and conduct human subject experiments to compare performance characteristics of market designs. The laboratory is an ideal environment to evaluate market structures under controlled conditions, providing an opportunity to gather evidence on the relative strengths and weaknesses of each design, and examine human decisions in economic environments that reflect salient features of the naturally occurring markets. Thus, experiments may serve as a valuable complement to equilibrium models in the design effort. Predictions from the equilibrium models will be compared to outcomes from the experimental markets to provide insights into real-world market design.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.