Overall Framework and Functional Design of the Quantified Gaming Method for New Power System Forms

Introduction

The new power system is a key player in implementing the “dual carbon” strategy and is crucial for ensuring China’s energy security in the long term and effectively addressing the challenges of power transformation. In July 2023, General Secretary Xi Jinping emphasized the need to “accelerate the construction of a clean, low-carbon, safe, abundant, economically efficient, demand-supply coordinated, and flexible smart new power system,” thus providing direction for the high-quality construction of the new power system. To solidly implement the requirements of the Party Central Committee and comprehensively serve the national strategy, exploring the forms of the new power system has become a hot topic in the industry.

Various studies have proposed that the power system forms transition from three elements: “source, network, and load” to four elements: “source, network, load, and storage.” The integration of diverse new technologies in the power grid is emphasized. Some literature analyzes the new power system forms from technical, network, and balance perspectives, suggesting a gradual developmental path for constructing this new system. Other studies focus on the transition towards a multi-energy, multi-level integrated energy system, with electricity as the platform and the grid as the core hub, highlighting the challenges faced during this transition and proposing strategies for addressing them.

This article focuses on the quantified analysis methods for new power system forms, proposing an overall framework and functional design driven by mechanism, technology, and model innovations. It designs the functional aspects of quantified analysis based on elements such as power sources, grids, loads, and energy storage, enabling comprehensive evaluations of the system’s forms.

1. Overall Framework

The construction of the new power system is a comprehensive engineering project within the economic and social environment. It requires a balance of four major goals: safety, greenness, economy, and sharing. This balance must ensure the reliable supply of electricity while promoting the clean, low-carbon, and circular development of China’s energy sector. Additionally, it aims to keep electricity costs manageable and realize the co-construction and sharing of value across the entire energy and power industry chain and value chain.

To achieve these objectives, the development of new power system forms needs to be implemented in typical scenarios, meeting the functional demands of different scenarios by reasonably configuring the elements of sources, grids, loads, and storage, and realizing the set goals step by step over different years. Achieving these goals relies on fully leveraging driving forces to ensure the scientific development of new power system forms.

The driving forces for the new power system forms mainly include three categories: model innovation, technology innovation, and mechanism innovation. Model innovation integrates internal and external production factors to promote market competition and cooperation, enhancing service innovation and efficiency. Technology innovation, through breakthroughs in principles, equipment innovations, and improvements in economic viability, strengthens the material and control foundations of the new power system. Mechanism innovation, through national policy documents and industry development plans, creates a favorable institutional environment and synergizes development efforts, guiding the new power system towards specific forms.

2. Functional Design

2.1 Overall Functionality

The quantified analysis method can achieve two main functionalities: 1) Form Development Analysis. This analyzes the forms and evolutionary paths of the new power system based on quantified driving force analysis for typical scenarios, providing evaluation indicators that reflect the development stages of the new power system; 2) Driving Force Optimization Analysis. After setting driving force parameter variables, the method calculates the forms of the new power system and overall evaluation results, analyzing discrepancies between evaluation indicators and development goals. Based on sensitivity analyses, it adjusts driving parameters and iterates this process, offering optimization suggestions.

2.2 Driving Force Analysis

2.2.1 Model Innovation Analysis

With the increase in market participants within the new power system, relevant entities will drive value creation through innovative cooperative competition models, significantly impacting the development of new power system forms. Value creation will focus on flexible resource demands, smoothing the volatility of renewable energy outputs, and reducing user energy costs. This analysis requires the capability to compute the operation characteristics and efficiency of these models, supporting the scale estimation of relevant model developments.

2.2.2 Technology Innovation Analysis

The construction of the new power system is challenged by various factors. On the one hand, the rapid development of renewable energy and the transition to a low-carbon energy system have led to significant contributions from high proportions of renewable energy generation. However, this contribution is often weak, with high load periods mismatched with renewable output. On the other hand, conventional power sources have limited adjustment capabilities, and new resources like energy storage face technological and cost constraints. Addressing these challenges requires solid implementation of the national innovation-driven development strategy to support high-quality construction of the new power system.

Technologies that significantly influence the construction of the new power system can be categorized into four types: carbon reduction technologies, system stability technologies, flexible interaction technologies, and globally impactful technologies.

2.2.3 Mechanism Innovation Analysis

The new power system is an open, complex mega-system involving all social sectors. It requires collaboration and the effective interplay of government and market forces to guide the development of the new power system toward a scientific form. Mechanism innovation driving force analysis aims to achieve two main functions: analyzing relevant policy documents and development plans, and assessing the roles of industry policies and market mechanisms in enhancing confidence among participants and guiding market behavior changes.

2.3 Analysis of New Power System Forms

2.3.1 Parameter Setting

Parameter setting consists of two parts: basic parameters and driving force parameters. Basic parameters gather essential data for the analysis of new power system forms, including current data on power sources, grids, loads, GIS data, and equipment ledgers. Driving force parameters facilitate interactive interfaces with driving force analyses, organizing computational results as inputs for the new power system form analysis.

2.3.2 Power Source Form Analysis

Power source form analysis focuses on the development projections of coal, hydro, and centralized renewable energies based on carbon reduction goals, load developments, and predictions for technologies such as CCUS and renewable energy integration. This analysis aims to minimize the construction and operation costs of the power system while calculating the development scale, structure, and layout of coal, hydro, and centralized renewable energies.