Climate Services for Clean Energy

Despite being cost competitive in many situations, renewable energy implementation remains limited largely due to its generation variability. The S2S4E project will provide sub-seasonal to seasonal (S2S) climate forecasts to foster renewable energy deployment while maintaining energy security. This information will enable the energy industry to assess the renewable energy sources capacity to meet demand over extended time horizons (weeks to months), focusing on the impact of climate variables on energy outputs. Based on a user-centric approach of climate services development, S2S4E will provide access to tailored real-time climate prediction products to optimise decision making across all levels of the energy sector community. A Decision Support Tool (DST) will be co-designed and co-developed with relevant industrial partners of the consortium that represent different needs and interests in terms of regions, renewable energy sources (wind, solar and hydro) and electricity demand. The DST is being developed taking into account eight historical case studies pointed as the most relevant by industrial partners. The case studies correspond to periods with an unusual climate behaviour affecting the energy market. Two of these case studies will be presented to illustrate the S2S climate forecast potential: a) During the first quarter of 2015 the United States experienced a widespread and extended episode of low surface wind speeds that had a strong impact on wind power generation to the point that some wind farms did not generate enough cash for their steady payments, and the value of wind farm assets decreased. b) In winter 2016 a significant decrease of wind speed was observed through all central and southern Europe leading to a reduction of wind energy generation; this wind drought coincided with a cold wave in December that had a significant impact on the power system, both creating a combination of large increase in electricity demand and lower than usual renewable-energy generation. The long-term objective of S2S4E is to make the European energy sector more resilient to climate variability and high impact events, such as heat waves and wind droughts.