Future Electricity Consumption and Wind Power Production in Sweden - Effects of Climate Change

Abstract: To maintain stability in the Swedish electricity grid, Svenska kraftnät must be able to predict future electricity production and consumption. Earlier this have been done by using historical data. Now the complexity of the system has increased, because the growing amount of electricity from non­dispatchable sources as well as the impact of climate change. Thus using only historical data will give an inaccurate result. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate how electricity consumption and wind power production in Sweden are affected by climate change, using temperature and wind data from climate models. To estimate future consumption and wind power produc­ tion, two models provided by Svenska Kraftnät are used, which takes hourly temper­ ature data at two meters above ground and wind data at 100 m height respectively as input. The data sets used as input are historical reanalysis data, which are bias cor­ rected by quantile mapping on historical and future climate model data for scenarios RCP 2.6 and 8.5. The results for consumption by 2090 was a decrease by 3 % for RCP 2.6 and 7 % for RCP 8.5 compared with historical consumption. This compares well to the estimated temperature increase of 1oC and 3.7oC respectively. For wind power production there are very little difference between historical and future generation on a yearly basis, but there are monthly variations. The results should be considered to be an indicator of the future electricity consumption and wind power production if no larger changes occur to the energy system. To achieve a more plausible scenario, variables such as new wind power plants, establishments of industries and increased use of air conditioning should also be taken into account.