Reversible retrofit to hydro plants for better renewables consumption in Central China

Substituting coal electricity with renewables is the fundamental measure to achieve carbon neutrality in China. However, the intermittency and the poor flexibility of power systems hinders the accommodation of renewables. Here, we put forward a new concept of reversible hydro plants that enable charging and discharging operation modes which are similar to pumped hydro but have lower construction costs. An integrated planning model is proposed to identify the benefits. First, a cost estimation model was constructed to identify the development potential and retrofit costs. Then, a planning model embedded with hourly dispatch for power systems is built to optimize the retrofit decision on reversible hydro plants. Finally, the power systems of Central China were applied to validate the benefits and generate the optimized retrofit plan. Results show that the reversible hydropower retrofit can effectively decrease the renewable curtailment and operation costs in Central China.