Status: Published
Citation: Bistline, J. (2021). "The Importance of Temporal Resolution in Modeling Deep Decarbonization of the Electric Power Sector." Environmental Research Letters 16:084005.
A new article “The Importance of Temporal Resolution in Modeling Deep Decarbonization of the Electric Power Sector” by John Bistline was recently published in Environmental Research Letters. This research investigates how temporal resolution—the degree of detail related to time periods within a year—can affect electric sector investments and costs and how these outcomes can change across different policy and technology assumptions. Three common temporal aggregation approaches are compared with results from a model with hourly resolution.
Results demonstrate how commonly used approaches to simplify temporal resolution in integrated assessment and energy system models may not reproduce fundamental relationships for power sector decarbonization or exhibit large quantitative differences from more detailed modeling. Key features missed in simplified approaches include nonlinear increases in abatement costs at higher levels; diminishing marginal returns for high penetrations of variable renewables; and the value of broader technological portfolios and carbon removal technologies. Representative day approaches can preserve many of these properties with large reductions in computational complexity.
Overall, the analysis suggests that higher temporal resolution is increasingly important for policy analysis, electric sector planning, and technology valuation in scenarios with deeper decarbonization and higher variable renewables.
**Link to Journal Publication:**See Environmental Research Letters.