Air Quality Impacts of Distributed Generation in the South Coast Air Basin (SoCAB) of California

3-D Snapshot of NOx emissions (plotted on ground-level
grid) and ground level O₃ concentrations (plotted above
the basin) for the baseline Scenario in 2010

The application of distributed resources to the California market portends significant benefits in overall electricity reliability, cost, power quality and overall emissions reduction. However, the implementation of a paradigm shift from central generation to distributed generation (DG) would result in significantly different emissions profiles with increased and widely dispersed stationary source emissions increases in several air basins (compared to central generation outside of the basin). The overall goal of this project is to develop and apply strategies for the accurate determination of the environmental and life cycle impacts of DG adoption in the South Coast Air Basin (SoCAB) for 2010

Goals

• Develop a set of likely DG scenarios
• Screen and prioritize the DG scenarios
  
• Conduct model simulations
  
• Closely coordinate project and transfer results to California regulatory agencies

Results

DG scenarios are classified in two categories according to the “likelihood” of their implementation. Some scenarios reflect an expected or realistic implementation of DG in the SoCAB. Also, a series of scenarios “that span the spectrum” are developed to consider various possibilities. These spanning scenarios are developed for scientific completeness, sensitivity analyses, and the determination of potential impacts of unexpected outcomes. More than 30 DG scenarios have been developed. This poster presents air quality results of one spanning and one realistic DG scenario. The realistic scenario distributes various types of DG throughout the basin on the basis of land-use type to meet 5% of the increased load demand between 2003 and 2010. The spanning scenario assumes a constant mix of DG installed throughout the basin with higher DG use to meet 20% of the increased power demand in 2010. The process to develop realistic DG Implementation Scenarios uses detailed data from geographic information systems (GIS) databases.

 

Results show:

» With realistic characterizations of DG use in SoCAB for the year 2010 the air quality impacts of DG are simulated to be less than 3 ppb for ozone and 2 mg/m3 for PM2.5

» DG installations may impact basin wide compliance with air quality standards only if they are adopted at significantly higher levels and/or emit more pollution than those considered in this study.

Recent Publications

Modeling Air Quality Impacts of Distributed Generation in the South Coast Air Basin of California Proceedings of 22nd Annual AAAR Conference, Anaheim, CA, US, October, 20-24, 2003.
Carreras, M, Samuelsen, S., Brouwer J., Medrano, M., Dabdub, D.

Urban Air Quality Impacts of Distributed Generation, Proceedings of ASME Turbo Expo 2003. Power for Land, Sea, and Air
Atlanta, Georgia, USA, June 16-19, 2003.
Medrano, M., Brouwer, J., Samuelsen, G.S., Carreras, M., Dabdub, D.

Personnel

Investigators:  D. Dabdub, J. Brouwer, and G.S. Samuelsen
Staff:  M. Rodriguez
Students:  MC

Sponsors

California Energy Commission,
California Air Resources Board,
South Coast Air Quality Management District

 

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