Power Plant Siting Results for GODEEEP

Introduction

This dataset contains power plant infrastructure siting information modeled by the Capacity Expansion Regional Feasibility (CERF) model for the GODEEEP project for the purpose of studying power plant landscape evolution under alternative capacity expansion scenarios. 

CERF is an open-source geospatial Python package for evaluating and analyzing future electricity technology capacity expansion feasibility.

Summaries of each of the two siting scenarios included are provided below. For additional information, see Ou et al. 2023and the GODEEEP website.

Scenario Descriptions

business_as_usual_ira_ccs_climate :

This scenario does not include any long-term federal policies requiring decarbonization.

It does include the US Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) incentives.

It assumes that CCS technologies are available.

net_zero_ira_ccs_climate:

This scenario includes a clean electricity grid in the U.S. by 2035 and a net-zero economy by 2050.

It does include US IRA incentives.

It assumes that CCS technologies are available.

Climate and Socioeconomic Assumptions

Climate: These scenarios include the dynamic effects of a climate pathway (RCP8.5) on heating and cooling degree days (HDD/CDD) in the period 2020-2050. 

Socioeconomic: Shared Socioeconomic Pathway 2. A "middle of the road" socioeconomic pathway where population and economic growth trends follow historical patterns.

Data Information

Coordinates provided in each of the data files follows the NAD 1983 Albers contiguous USA Coordinate Reference System (ESRI:102003).

New infrastructure sitings are provided for the 11 states in the Western Interconnection including: Arizona, California, Colorado, Idaho, Montana, Nevada, New Mexico, Utah, Oregon, Washington, and Wyoming.

The file type represents a specific spatial resolution of infrastructure sitings:

 1 km level data: 

Includes new power plant sitings by year at a 1 km-squared resolution.

For technologies where a representative power plant facility can be sited within the area of a single square km (e.g., natural gas, biomass), coordinates provided at this resolution are representative of the entire plant location where the facility is sited. 

For Solar PV, Solar CSP, Onshore Wind, and Offshore Wind technologies, representative power plants (i.e., farms) are typically larger than a single square km. Therefore, coordinates provided at the 1 km-squared resolution in this file represent the total capacity (MW) of these technologies that was sited within a 1 km x 1km grid cell and does not represent a standalone wind or solar farm facility or an individual wind turbine.

Plant-level data

This file type includes all power plant locations at the plant level including both new additions and pre-existing facilities.

Coordinates in this file represent the center of a power plant facility.

For CERF-sited technologies where a representative power plant facility can be sited within the area of a single square km (e.g., natural gas,  biomass), coordinates will match those provided in the CERF siting output file.

For coodinates associated with CERF-sited Solar PV, Solar CSP, Onshore Wind, and Offshore Wind farms, the center coordinates of the farm are provided. Farms in this file are spatially-clustered aggregates of individual 1 km-squared solar and wind sitings from the CERF-siting output.

File Descriptions

File Name
File Type
Scenario

power_plant_additions_1km_bau.csv
1 km data

business_as_usual_ira_ccs_climate

power_plants_bau.csv
Plant-level data
business_as_usual_ira_ccs_climate

power_plant_additions_1km_net_zero.csv
1 km data
net_zero_ira_ccs_climate

power_plants_net_zero.csv
Plant-level data
net_zero_ira_ccs_climate

Data Descriptions

Column Name
Data Description
Units

scenario
Name of scenario
N/A

region_name
US state name
N/A

tech_id
Unique technology identifier
N/A

technology
Type of generation technology with detailed information on cooling type, turbine type, hub-height, and carbon capture (as applicable)
N/A

technology_simple
Type of generation technology with no additional detailed information
N/A

unit_size_mw
Rated power plant capacity 
Megawatts (MW)

xcoord
x coordinate of siting location
N/A

ycoord
y coordinate of siting location
N/A

buffer_in_km
Buffer applied to siting location in CERF
kilometers (km)

sited_year
Year power plant was sited
N/A

retirement_year
Year power plant was retired
N/A

lifetime_yrs
Technology lifetime
Years

operational_life_yrs
Years technology operated for
Years

locational_marginal_price_usd_per_mwh
Locational marginal price of energy
USD/Megawatt-hour (MWh)

generation_mwh_per_year
Annual generation 
MWh

capacity_factor_fraction
Capacity factor
Fraction

carbon_capture_rate_fraction
Rate of carbon capture 
Fraction

fuel_price_usd_per_mmbtu
Fuel price
USD/million British thermal units

heat_rate_btu_per_kWh
Heat rate
British thermal units/kilowatt-hour

variable_om_usd_per_mwh
Variable operations and maintenance cost
USD/MWh

cerf_sited
Binary variable indicating whether the power plant was sited by CERF (value=1) or a pre-existing power plant (value=0)
N/A

Acknowledgement

This research was supported by the Grid Operations, Decarbonization, Environmental and Energy Equity Platform (GODEEEP) Investment, under the Laboratory Directed Research and Development (LDRD) Program at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL).

PNNL is a multi-program national laboratory operated for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) by Battelle Memorial Institute under Contract No. DE-AC05-76RL01830.