Longer term strategic decision making for coal-based power systems incorporating CO₂ sequestration

This research is inspired by forecasts which show that coal-based power plants will remain an important part of the nation's and world's energy mix. However since coal-based plants generate a substantial amount of CO₂ with significant impact on the greenhouse effect, CO₂ is expected to be further regulated in the future. CCS is a promising technology but has a variety of costs involved in a full systems approach: where, when and how to construct and operate potential new plants, retrofit existing plants, construct and operate injection wells and pipelines. This is strategically important with a planning horizon of 20-40 years. We develop a mathematical programming model of the entire system with consideration of all costs and revenues and environmental regulations. We develop an algorithm incorporating time aggregation and a rolling horizon cascade approach and present computational experiments.