Despite the difficulties, the general direction must be done, and Europe is a viable model. “When the proportion of new energy is not high, this problem is not yet prominent, but as the proportion becomes higher, this problem will become very prominent.”
Ma Li, deputy chief engineer of the National Grid Energy Research Institute, said that the reverse distribution of energy supply and demand in China determines that energy resources must be deployed on a larger scale. The electricity market helps break the barriers between provinces. With the rapid development of wind and new energy, it is urgent to build a unified national electricity market. Regardless of whether it is mid-to-long term or spot, market trading mechanisms need to consider how new energy can participate. For example, new energy power generation, demand side, energy storage, etc. can be put together to build a more flexible trading system.
Although the current market construction is still in its infancy, it has encountered various problems such as unbalanced funds under the dual-track system. However, many market-related persons interviewed by a reporter from Caijing believe that the spot market pilot does make companies clearly feel the market-guided price discovery mechanism, especially for power products, where the market can reflect the price of electricity under seasonal and time-based differences. And value, “No need to manually set (price).
In the long run, a fully market-oriented electricity market is more conducive to the development of wind and new energy. Zhu Tong said that the bidding rule in the spot power market is marginal cost pricing, while the marginal cost of wind and photovoltaic power generation is zero, and it must be the priority to go online in the future. Therefore, accelerating the construction of a unified power spot market and power auxiliary service market is the most important guarantee mechanism for the development of renewable energy.
4. The role of carbon market and green certificate market
For the power system, balance is the core issue. Many of the aforementioned issues discussed in the lack of ancillary services, capacity market and other mechanisms are centered on the balance-related characteristics of the electrical products themselves, and they also highlight the cost and cost of new energy utilization. To absorb the difference in cost.
But power products do not only possess the attributes of electricity itself. An expert analyzed by a reporter from Caijing that electricity, as a product, can be broken down into four parts: capacity, electricity, auxiliary services, and green attributes. Thermal power has capacity, power and auxiliary services, and new energy has power and green attributes.
Obviously, in the electricity market, considering only the first three attributes, new energy cannot compete with thermal power. But its green attributes need to be reflected in possible markets and price mechanisms such as carbon markets, green certificates, and carbon taxes.
The carbon market was the first to start. On January 5, 2021, the Ministry of Ecology and Environment issued the “Regulations for Carbon Emission Trading Management (Trial). According to this approach, 2021 will be the first compliance cycle of the national carbon market. The main trading products in the future will include carbon emission allowances and China’s certified voluntary emission reductions.(CCER).
High-carbon-emission coal-fired power projects are the first targets of control in the national carbon market, while zero-carbon wind power and photovoltaic projects are not subject to carbon market control. In the carbon market environment, coal-fired power projects will carry an increasingly heavy burden of carbon emissions, reducing their competitiveness against wind and solar new energy projects. At the same time, Fengguang New Energy can also directly obtain economic benefits from the carbon market through the CCER mechanism.
However, in the initial stage of the national carbon market, CCER trading will be suspended. The “Interim Measures for the Administration of Voluntary Greenhouse Gas Emission Reduction Transactions” that formulated the detailed rules for CCER are still under revision. The approval of the CCER project is currently suspended, and when it will restart is to be determined.
At present, the impact of the carbon market pilots that have been launched in China on the cost of thermal power is not obvious. “Southern Energy Observation” published an analysis article on electricity trading in the carbon market in January this year. According to the current Guangdong carbon market transaction mechanism and price, the carbon transaction cost only accounts for 0.5% of the normal power generation cost of thermal power units It will basically not affect the current operating costs of thermal power units; if the quota ratio is 5% and the carbon trading price reaches 300 yuan, it will account for about 6% of power generation costs, which will become one of the important factors in the price of thermal power units in the electricity market.
Europe, which has been exploring the carbon market for 15 years, has further tightened its carbon allowances in 2018, and its carbon price has exceeded the high of 30 euros several times in the past six months. Estimated at 28 euros, the cost of coal power generation will increase by 22 euros per MWh, which significantly reduces the overall competitiveness of coal power.
In addition to the carbon market, the renewable energy consumption guarantee mechanism is another major policy support measure for green power consumption. The Chinese government issued the “Notice on Establishing and Improving the Guarantee Mechanism of Renewable Energy Power Consumption” in May 2019, and will start to implement the guarantee mechanism of renewable energy consumption in 2020. The weight indicator of the responsibility of renewable energy power consumption included in the mechanism is currently the only mandatory and binding assessment indicator for the consumption of wind and new energy in various regions.Mark.
According to the above notice, each provincial-level energy authority is responsible for the implementation of the power of consumption responsibility in the provincial administrative region, and the power grid company assumes the organizational responsibility for the implementation of the power of consumption responsibility in the operating area. The energy authority of the State Council monitors and evaluates the completion of the consumption responsibility weights of various provincial administrative regions, and requires market entities that have not fulfilled the consumption responsibility weights to rectify within a time limit, and compare the consumption of renewable energy with the total energy consumption and intensity of the country. Double control” assessment link.
A report issued by Bloomberg New Energy Finance in July 2020 stated that in 2019, there will be 15 provinces in China in terms of non-hydropower renewable energy consumption.( District, city) has not reached the minimum consumption responsibility weight. In 2020, it is estimated that 5 to 8 provinces (districts, cities) will not reach the minimum consumption weight target of non-hydropower renewable energy.
According to relevant regulations, there are two performance channels for the parties responsible for consumption that cannot achieve their goals: One is to voluntarily subscribe for renewable energy green power certificates (hereinafter referred to as green Certificate); the second is to purchase the excess renewable energy electricity consumption from market entities that have exceeded the annual consumption.
2020 is the first year of the assessment of the consumption guarantee mechanism, and the transaction of renewable energy power consumption is about to begin. On January 26, 2021, Beijing Electric Power Trading Center issued the “Beijing Electric Power Trading Center Renewable Energy Power Excessive Consumption Trading Rules(Trial)< /span>“, will carry out inter-provincial excess consumption transaction volume in the near future.
According to this rule, one renewable energy excess consumption voucher is generated for every 1 MWh of consumption, and transactions are conducted through bilateral negotiation, centralized bidding, listing, and rolling matching. In principle, only annual transactions are conducted. The annual electricity billing will be carried out in the second week after the completion. In addition, the green certificate trading results are synchronized to the power trading center every month, and no longer repeated transactions in the excess consumption market.
The progress of the green card is not satisfactory. The launch of the green certificate originally hoped to replace part of the pressure of government subsidies by trading green certificates in the market. The new energy electricity sold with green certificates no longer enjoys government subsidized electricity prices, which also led to the high price of green certificates and the later The cheaper the green certificate for new energy projects developed.More importantly, the green certificate is currently purchased voluntarily, not “compulsory”. The buyer “generates electricity with love”. Under the expensive price of the green certificate, for those who have the appraisal of consumption, they can invest in green electricity, buy green electricity or Buying excess renewable energy consumption is more motivated than buying green certificates.
The transaction of green certificates is therefore not active. Voluntary subscription of green certificates in China started on July 1, 2017. According to the data of China’s green certificate subscription platform, as of January 28, 2020, there were only 2,510 in total. Subscribers subscribed for 72438 green certificates (1 MWh of new energy electricity generates a green certificate). In Europe and America, with the support of a mandatory quota system and a mature power market, long-term power purchase agreements between power users and new energy power generation companies (PPA) More and more popular, on the one hand, PPA ensures that market entities can purchase electricity at a stable price while meeting the assessment requirements for green electricity quotas.
In its reply on September 23, 2020, the National Energy Administration stated that it is accelerating the construction of a technical support system for market-based trading of green certificates and excess consumption of renewable energy and will continue to improve green certificates. The trading system expands its market size and trading scope to ensure an orderly connection between the two.
Li Junfeng believes that the current implementation pressure of this mechanism is not enough for all regions, and it is too difficult for all regions to complete the current targets. In the future, this mechanism should be improved, the differences in the weight of responsibility between regions should be narrowed, and the market transaction methods for completing the weight of consumption should be broadened. Let all localities bear a balanced consumption weight to achieve the goal of improving the national consumption level.
Liu Bingqi, a senior consultant in the power department of the Rocky Mountain Institute, told Caijing that the guarantee mechanism for the consumption of renewable energy is mainly to set the lower limit and short-term goals for the consumption of renewable energy, and to guide and encourage long-term rapid development. Not yet enough. In the long run, this mechanism needs to be effectively combined with other long-term incentive policy mechanisms to form a strong development incentive and restraint guarantee. For example, formulating development plans consistent with the 2030 renewable energy development goals and carbon neutral goals, and linking with the carbon market trading mechanism.
According to a reporter from Caijing, With the improvement of the development goals of Fengguang New Energy, the weight indicators of consumption responsibility in various regions will also be adjusted accordingly. An unnamed person from the relevant research institution told the Caijing reporter that the weight indicators will be dynamically adjusted according to the actual development while playing a leading role in the medium and long term. According to the latest targets of carbon peaking and carbon neutrality, China’s renewable energyDuring the “Three Five-Year” period, the speed will be significantly accelerated. After 2021, the consumption indicators that are broken down to various regions will use the above targets as the important measurement boundary.
V. New energy challenges the stability of the power grid
For power system operation, a high proportion of renewable energy is bringing new challenges.
The traditional power system is a system in which the power supply fluctuates with the load. After new energy is added, the volatility of the power supply also increases, requiring other power sources to also stabilize the fluctuation of the new energy. The higher the proportion of new energy sources, the greater the fluctuation, and the greater the adjustments other regulated power sources need to make.
In addition, the output curve of new energy often does not match the load curve, and in extreme cases it even presents the opposite characteristics. New energy output often presents the characteristics of “extremely hot and no wind, extreme cold and no light, no light at night”, and extreme cold, extreme heat and evening peak periods are just when power is needed to increase output, but the scenery is often not as good. . A power grid company expert (Ma Ke, Hydropower and New Energy Division, State Grid Dispatching Center) introduced that on a certain day during the cold wave in mid-December 2020, The photovoltaic utilization hours of the entire grid were less than one hour, which directly led to a significant increase in coal consumption that day.
The large-scale power rationing in Hunan this winter that once attracted widespread attention this winter is a typical epitome of the contradiction between energy transition and power supply security. As of the end of 2019, Hunan’s clean energy installed capacity reached 25.94 million kilowatts, and the proportion of clean energy installed capacity reached 54.8%, of which hydropower, wind power, and photovoltaic installed capacity were 17.44 million kilowatts, 4.27 million kilowatts and 3.44 million kilowatts, and the installed capacity nationwide seventh. Clean energy electricity is 96.2 billion kilowatt-hours, a ratio of 51.6%. This ratio ranks first in the central and eastern regions and fourth in the country. More than half of the electricity comes from clean energy.
Hunan’s electricity and load have maintained a high growth rate, and there have been power restrictions before. In this winter, the peak load contradiction further broke out. Hunan Hydropower was in the dry season, and the wind and wind output was unstable, and it was difficult to peak to support the long-term high-load operation of the power grid.
As a bottom-line coal power, living conditions in Hunan are difficult. Due to the increase in the proportion of renewable energy, the utilization hours of coal power in Hunan Province have been operating at a low level of less than 4,000 hours for a long time, and have been declining year by year, from 3,885 in 2018. The hour is reduced to less than 3700 hours in 2020. In addition, the province is a coal importing province and the price of raw materials is relatively high. Power generation companies do not have the power to invest in coal power. The installed capacity of coal power has decreased by about 6 from 2016 to 2019.