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Final Interim Wholesale Power Price Forecast
April 2, 2008 | document 2008-05
This report describes an interim revision to the Northwest Power and Conservation Council’s wholesale power price forecast. This forecast incorporates revised fuel price forecasts, estimated renewable resource acquisitions in response to state renewable portfolio standards, resource acquisitions needed to maintain target resource adequacy standards, and revised estimates of the future cost of CO2 production. This forecast supersedes the final wholesale power price forecast of the Fifth Power Plan. This forecast will be updated as the development of the Sixth Plan progresses.
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Marginal Carbon Dioxide Production Rates of the Northwest Power System
June 13, 2008 | document 2008-08
This report extends the analysis described in Council’s “Interim Wholesale Power Price Forecast.” One of the benefits of conservation is that it avoids CO2 emissions. The benefit it provides depends on what generating resources would be replaced and how much CO2 they produce. This requires understanding what generating resources are on the margin; that is, the generation that could be displaced by the conservation. In the Northwest, the average marginal CO2 production is substantially higher than the average CO2 production from all electricity generation. This is because hydroelectricity and wind, which have low operating costs and no CO2 emissions are brought on-line before coal-fired or natural gas-fired generating units. Because only the marginal plants would be displaced by conservation, it would not be proper to use the average of CO2 emissions from all power generation to estimate the CO2 saved through conservation. This paper evaluates what resources are on the margin in every hour and what the CO2 reduction would be as a result of conservation. The paper also provides estimates of the total annual CO2 production of the Northwest power system assuming different combinations of future natural gas prices and CO2 emissions costs.
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