A Comparative Study on Pumped Storage Efficiency under Different Stakeholder Objectives for Balancing Renewable Energy Fluctuations and Curtailment

While Pumped storage can effectively cope with the increasing demand for regulation flexibility from both the power sources and power grids, the impact of the dispatch demand from different stakeholders on the round-trip efficiency of pumped storage is unclear. Based on the difference between variable renewable energy (VRE) power generation and grid demand for stability, this work sets different scheduling objectives for the hybrid operation of pumped storage and VRE. Then, a short-term optimal scheduling model was established to analyzes the round-trip efficiency of pumped storage power plant under two objective functions. The results show that: (1) The round-trip efficiency decreases 1.49% when it promotes VRE consumption by 0.96% under the high demand for VRE consumption over 95%. (2) The daily generation of pumped storage increases by 1.16% when it reduces the VRE fluctuations, which also reduces the grid-connected power of VRE by 1%. This study highlights the need for careful consideration of the trade-offs between grid stability and VRE utilization efficiency to ensure sustainable and reliable power system operations.