Concentrated solar power for a reliable expansion of energy systems with high renewable penetration considering seasonal balance

With the increasing proportion of variable renewable energy characterized by fluctuation and the promotion of the “Clean Heating” policy, the problem of seasonal energy imbalance of the system has become increasingly challenging. There is a lack of effective means to mitigate this challenge under the background of gradual compression of the construction space for traditional thermal units. Concentrated solar power (CSP) is a promising technology to replace thermal units by integrating emergency boilers to cope with extreme weather, and can meet long-time energy balance as a seasonal peak regulation source. In this paper, we propose a long-term high-resolution expansion planning model of energy systems integrating CSP to address seasonal energy imbalances. The model takes into account both investment and operation considerations in full hourly resolution for the whole year based on a fast cluster optimization method. With the projection to 2050, we take the energy system in Xinjiang province which is a typical area of the “Clean Heating” project with rich irradiance as a case study. It shows that the optimal deployment of CSP and electric boiler (EB) can result in a 8.73 % reduction in costs, a 19.72 % decrease in the peak-valley difference of net load, and a substantial 58.24 % reduction in renewable curtailment at 65 % renewable penetration compared to the base scenario.