Problem 9.1

Integrated Energy Grids

Problem 9.1

Producing electricity in coal and gas power plants entails the efficiency, CO2emissions and fuel cost shown in Table 1. What is the cheapest option to produce electricity? Which CO2 tax would be necessary to alter the merit order of the two technologies and incentivise lower CO2 emissions per MWh of produced electricity?

import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import pandas as pd
import pypsa

fuel_cost_coal=6.2    #euro/MWh_th
efficiency_coal=0.33  #MWh_el/MWh_th
emissions_coal=0.336  #tonne/MWh_th

fuel_costs_gas=20.1   #euro/MWh_th
efficiency_gas=0.59   #MWh_el/MWh_th
emissions_gas=0.198   #tonne/MWh_th

el_cost_coal = fuel_cost_coal / efficiency_coal
el_cost_coal  #euro/MWh_el

18.78787878787879

el_cost_gas = fuel_costs_gas / efficiency_gas
el_cost_gas  #euro/MWh_el

34.067796610169495

emissions_coal_per_MWh_el = emissions_coal / efficiency_coal
emissions_coal_per_MWh_el  #tonne/MWh_el

1.0181818181818183

emissions_gas_per_MWh_el = emissions_gas / efficiency_gas
emissions_gas_per_MWh_el  #tonne/MWh_el

0.3355932203389831

The tax value must be the equal or higher than the one that makes the cost of electricity from gas lower or equal to the cost of electricity from coal.

\[el\_cost\_gas + emissions\_gas\_per\_MWh\_el \cdot tax \leq el\_cost\_coal + emissions\_coal\_per\_MWh\_el \cdot tax\]

tax=(el_cost_gas - el_cost_coal) / (emissions_coal_per_MWh_el - emissions_gas_per_MWh_el)
tax  #euro/tonne

22.385252069224983