Emission pricing and locational signal impact on generation portfolio in large scale Queensland network

The evolving generation planning paradigm has been shifting from reliability-driven to market-driven, and further to environment-driven arena, while cumulatively adding up these consecutive objectives. The emerging issues of the electricity market and emission pricing inherently fetch uncertainties in the planning horizon. This study evaluates the `screening-curve based´ least-cost generation entry along with the `market-based´ profit-maximizing generation investment. A Markov Chain Monte Carlo based scheme is implemented in the abovementioned algorithms to capture the uncertainty of electricity price. The locational signals of the generation resources are also included in the model. This paper analyzes possible impacts on the generation portfolio and electricity price that may emerge due to the employment of the `Clean Energy Bill, 2011´ in the Australian National Electricity Market (NEM). An analytical study is presented in this paper, simulating the proposed framework to the Queensland network of the Australian NEM. Simulation results show market signals for generation investments, highlighting considerable change in the energy matrix and electricity price in the coming decade.