The HOMER Micropower Optimization Model is a computer model developed by the U.S. National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) to assist in the design of micropower systems and to facilitate the comparison of power generation technologies across a wide range of applications. HOMER models a power system’s physical behavior and its life-cycle cost, which is the total cost of installing and operati...

It is difficult to eliminate all market power in electricity markets and it is therefore frequently suggested that some market power should be tolerated: extra revenues contribute to fixed cost recovery, facilitate investment, and increase security of supply. This suggestion implicitly assumes all generation technologies benefit equally from market power. We assess a mixture of conventional and...

Gasification is one of the promising technologies to convert biomass to gaseous fuels for distributed power generation. However, the commercial exploitation of biomass energy suffers from a number of logistics and technological challenges. In this review, the barriers in each of the steps from the collection of biomass to electricity generation are highlighted. The effects of parameters in supp...

1 Advances in electricity generation and storage technologies coupled with declines in cost, the planned roll-out of smart metering and favourable regulation have all led to a rapid increase in the number of consumers in Europe and the USA producing or storing electricity at home — through solar panels1, electric vehicles2, batteries3 or other means. In the UK, for instance, by the end of Decem...

The paper assesses the demand for rural electricity services and contrasts it with the technology options available for rural electrification. Decentralised Distributed Generation can be economically viable as reflected by case studies reported in literature and analysed in our field study. Project success is driven by economically viable technology choice; however it is largely contingent on o...

We present a techno-economic analysis of solar-driven high-temperature electrolysis systems used for the production of hydrogen and synthesis gas. We consider different strategies for the incorporation of solar energy, distinguished by the use of differing technologies to provide solar power and heat: (i) thermal approaches (system 1) using concentrated solar technologies to provide heat and to...

The goal of this paper is to compare the amortized cost of electricity from two different types of solar thermal energy technologies with the cost of electricity from a coal-fired power plant utilizing newly developed carbon capture (amine-scrubbing) technology. Coal, natural gas, and nuclear fuels are the dominant sources of electrical energy in the United States. Currently, the primary source...

There has been intense recent interest in the vulnerability of the US electric power sector to the potentially adverse impacts of global warming. In this paper I use a three-phased approach to investigate the consequences of climate-driven temperature increases on electricity supply and demand within US states. Reduced-form long-run responses of electricity demand to temperature are estimated b...