From the extraction of natural resources through final consumption, the energy ecosystem affects the lives of every American. Understanding this complex interconnected system is vitally important to building and maintaining U.S. energy dominance. Today, fossil fuels make up most of our nation’s energy mix, and as the only U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) national laboratory dedicated to fossil energy (FE) research, the National Energy Technology Laboratory (NETL) plays a crucial role. The Laboratory is focused on improving the efficiency, cost, and reliability of the current coal- and gas-fired power plants while also developing and maturing new fossil energy technologies.  

NETL implements a broad spectrum of energy research and development (R&D) programs designed to enable domestic coal, natural gas, and oil to economically power our nation while protecting our environment. The Lab’s research is vitally important because, in addition to providing the lion’s share of the nation’s energy production today, abundant and dependable fossil fuels are likely to remain the leading energy source well into the future according to projections from the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s (EIA) Annual Energy Outlook 2018.

These projections are based on what may happen given certain assumptions and methodologies, but many events may influence energy markets. Future developments in technologies, demographics, and resources will create challenges that need to be addressed by NETL R&D. Such efforts will help determine which technologies may have the largest benefit in future energy scenarios.

When considering tomorrow’s energy ecosystem, NETL relies on its unique set of advanced computational tools and analyses to simultaneously investigate complex interactions among technologies and markets. The tools are critical because the choices must be carefully investigated to build the best foundation for the energy ecosystem of the future. 

Computational tools for future-minded design

One way NETL is overcoming existing challenges is by leveraging computational advances and integrating multiple types of energy analyses into a dynamic modeling and optimization platform. A major driving force in this area is the Institute for the Design of Advanced Energy Systems (IDAES), a multi-institutional partnership, which NETL initiated in 2016 to enable advanced design, investment, and operation support for the U.S. electric power generation system.

Specifically, IDAES is creating a computational framework to enable the optimal design of individual components and complete power plants, to rapidly assess retirement or refurbishment options of aging fossil plants, to ensure optimum performance over a full range of operating conditions, and to identify preferred plant performance characteristics of existing or new facilities that maximize overall grid performance. For example, researchers are working to increase the efficiency of coal-fired power plants and increase their reliability through system-wide optimization. They are also looking to the future by accelerating the development of the most promising new high efficiency, low emission, flexible advanced fossil energy systems.

IDAES is developing entirely new process system engineering (PSE) capabilities to support design and optimization that transcend the limitations of current approaches. Engineers typically rely on commercial simulation packages to simulate and model process flowsheets, but these existing tools suffer critical limitations that prohibit large-scale process optimization. With IDAES, researchers are building an open-source PSE framework from the ground up that is specifically designed for optimization.

Optimization enables researchers to identify the best possible designs by considering thousands of decision variables, design constraints, and economic and environmental objectives all at once. This process is much more rigorous than merely finding an improvement to a system by changing a handful of decision variables that seem important.

Because of recent advances in modeling techniques, solution algorithms, and computing power, researchers at NETL can provide industry with design and decision analysis capabilities that enable significant savings through better choices in investments and operations. Optimizations that were previously limited to systems with relatively low complexity can now be done over vastly more complex systems in reasonable amounts of time. The result is the ability to assess additional alternatives more quickly while incorporating the entire power system into the evaluation. These improvements could result in tens of billions of dollars in savings through better choices in investments and operations.

With the successful creation of IDAES, a comprehensive, open-source framework will soon be in place to enable large-scale optimization of complex, innovative processes spanning conceptual design and process synthesis to dynamic optimization. Such advancements will help ensure that the U.S. energy portfolio will continue to provide uninterrupted, affordable and reliable energy.

Energy market analysis

Another way the Laboratory is leading the development of the energy ecosystem of the future is through energy market analysis. NETL relies on science-based models that can accurately predict a great many scenarios, including how NETL R&D will affect the cost of electricity, carbon emissions, job creation, and many other critical factors related to energy production from fossil fuels. The Lab has developed significant expertise in energy-economy modeling to evaluate the impact of a new technology under a variety of policy, regulatory and market scenarios.

So, what are the models that NETL uses, and how do they work? One of the most widely known models, the National Energy Modeling System (NEMS) was created by EIA. This model is primarily used to develop the Annual Energy Outlook, which industry and policy makers use to study the factors expected to shape U.S. energy markets through 2040. NETL’s expertise in fossil energy research provides important contributions to this model. Code developed at the Lab has been integrated into the model and EIA consults NETL on the expanded capabilities of the model, which better represent FE technologies and improve the representation of water availability and constraints within the power sector.

MARKAL, a name derived from market and allocation, was developed by the Energy Technology Systems Analysis Programme of the International Energy Agency. NETL uses this model to find the least expensive combination of technologies to meet a specific goal and calculates resulting environmental emissions and water consumption and withdrawals.

Current NETL R&D can be factored into the market models, and compared to a baseline of no R&D. The results of this comparison show projections where the cost of electricity is reduced and environmental targets are met. Even more useful, researchers can see how other scenarios might play out. For example, if the Lab increased its advanced energy system research efforts, the models can project the effects of this change. In this way, NETL can best use its resources to focus on staying aligned with DOE goals, even as conditions change.

Efforts are underway to develop an enhanced open-source economy model, which extends the current platform and ultimately integrates with IDAES. This model will build on current NETL energy-economy modeling capabilities and expertise in the development of sub-modules for NEMS. This capability will enable solving more complex models that better represent the potential of new technologies in market models that look forward 20 to 30 years.

Combining expertise in market analysis and advanced computational tools, NETL is working hard to lay the foundation for the energy ecosystem of the future by enabling holistic analysis of complex interactions. R&D conducted by the Lab today will continue to address the technological challenges that are likely to emerge to ensure the availability of economically viable choices to maintain the availability and reliability of cost-effective energy for many generations to come.