Strategic market assessment of distributed resources. Final report

Technical Report · Fri Dec 01 04:00:00 EST 1995

OSTI ID:233383

Hamm, G; Graves, F; Taylor, A ^[1]

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1. and others

A distributed resource (DR) is a small generator, storage device, or demand-side program designed to provide power to a localized group of customers and/or capture other locational benefits. It can enjoy certain economic benefits over central generation because of its location and size. DRs are in limited use at this point in time, but may become more prevalent in the future as the regulatory environment and economics of electricity production and distribution change. The study examines two key issues that have not been addressed in previous studies. First, different possible future industry-structure scenarios and the extent to which DR might come into use in each of these scenarios were analyzed. Second, the economic benefits of DR were analyzed from the point of view of various stakeholders including customers of various sizes, not just from the point of view of current vertically integrated investor-owned utilities. A mathematical model was developed to predict the penetration of DR generation into the power generation market at various intervals over the next fifteen years, and data to support this model were gathered from a wide range of diverse sources. Results of the study include: discussions of the factors influencing the penetration of DR; discussions of what type of DR will be installed, where DR will be installed, and who will install DR; and forecasts of the penetration of DR under various scenarios. The conclusion of the evaluation was that DRs will almost certainly become more prevalent in the future, but the degree will depend greatly on the way in which the future industry structure unfolds.

• Research Organization: Electric Power Research Inst., Palo Alto, CA (United States); Applied Decision Analysis, Inc., Menlo Park, CA (United States); Brattle/IRI, Boston, MA (United States); Distributed Utility Associates, San Ramon, CA (United States); ECONIX, San Francisco, CA (United States)
• Sponsoring Organization: Electric Power Research Inst., Palo Alto, CA (United States)
• OSTI ID: 233383
• Report Number(s): EPRI-TR--106055
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

24 POWER TRANSMISSION AND DISTRIBUTION
29 ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY
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DISPERSED STORAGE AND GENERATION
ECONOMIC ANALYSIS
ELECTRIC POWER INDUSTRY
LOAD MANAGEMENT
MARKET