Anthropogenic Heat of Power Generation in Singapore: analyzing today and a future electromobility scenario

Abstract

This report studies the anthropogenic heat emissions of Singapore’s power generation sector and evaluates the potential future emissions with electromobility across the island. We thus developed a power plant dispatch model to downscale the total heat released by the power sector in 2016. Taking electricity demand and fuel prices as inputs, the model was based on an energy-only model of the National Electricity Market of Singapore. Generation companies were assumed to bid at marginal cost and discount the value of cogeneration heat. This led to a higher correlation of electricity prices and demand than in reality, and sensitivity to fuel prices. The model is capable of calculating the dispatch, fuel consumption, cogeneration heat and waste heat streams of each plant. These heat profiles would then serve as inputs to a WRF mesoscale model of Singapore. The model was calibrated with the monthly fuel mix and annual fuel consumption in 2016 via hyperparameter optimization. An RMSE of 4.67 ktoe was achieved in the electricity produced per month and per fuel, and the total released heat was within 1.88% of the energy statistics. Simulation of the baseline electricity demand showed that CCGT PNG plants emit over half of the waste heat (1796 ktoe of 3282 ktoe), with the Senoko power plant releasing half of this. Cogeneration CCGT plants released about 882 ktoe of waste heat, while producing as much as 1813 ktoe of process heat. As much as 47% of the total waste heat is released into the air as sensible heat, and 27% as latent heat, with the rest released into the sea. Based on data from a previous study on the anthropogenic heat emissions in the transportation sector, we simulated a scenario wherein the road transportation in Singapore was fully electrified. This scenario could have an additional waste heat of 248 ktoe, and an additional electricity demand of 369 ktoe. This additional demand represents a reduction of vehicle heat on the roads by a factor of six, and more heat is emitted at far-away and efficient cogeneration plants. Overall, the estimated reduction in total anthropogenic heat is 1473 ktoe, or about 7% less than in 2016.