KonStGas

  • contact:

    Dr. Armin Ardone

    Dipl.-Ing. Christoph Nolden

  • project group:

    Distributed Energy Systems and Networks

  • funding:

    Federal Ministry for Economic Affairs and Energy (BMWi)

  • partner:

    Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) - Institute for Industrial Production (IIP)

    Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) - Engler-Bunte-Institute

    DBI-Gastechnologisches Institut gGmbH Freiberg

    Forschungszentrum Jülich - Institute of Energy and Climate Research (IEK)

    Fraunhofer Institute for Environmental, Safety, and Energy Technology

    Fraunhofer Institute for Wind Energy & Energy System Technology

    Gas- und Wärme-Institut Essen (GWI)

    ONTRAS - VNG Gastransport GmbH

    OTH Regensburg

    Ruhr-University Bochum - Chair of Energy Systems and Energy Economics

    RWE Germany AG

    RWTH Aachen - Institute of Power Systems and Power Economics

    TU Clausthal - Institute of Petroleum Engineering

    TU Dresden - Chair of Energy Economics

    Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Environment and Energy

    50Hertz Transmission GmbH

  • start:

    08/2013

  • end:

    09/2016

Integration of fluctuating renewable energy sources by the convergent use of electricity and gas grids

The high volatility and limited predictability of renewable electricity generation lead to an increasing decoupling of electricity production and consumption. The energy system is rapidly changing from a supply-driven to a consumption-driven structure. Taken as a whole, the difference between the rising generation of fluctuating renewable energy sources and the reduced capacity of conventional power plants covering electricity supply gaps will cause problems in maintaining the security of supply in future.

Therefore, the crucial point is the development of cost-effective energy storage technologies and capacities with minimal energy losses. Within the project "KonStGas - integration of fluctuating renewable energy sources by convergent use of electricity and gas grids", 13 research institutions and three grid operators have joined forces under the leadership of the DBI Gastechnologisches Institut in Freiberg, Germany. The consortium plans to investigate, technically and economically, the opportunities that arise from the coupling of electricity and gas grids.

The project partners analyse the electricity and gas grid in order to identify the advantages and potentials of a coupling of the two transport systems for energy storage. In doing so, the research focus is on capacities for converting electricity from renewable energy sources into renewable gas by electrolysis and methanation ("Power-to-Gas"). Only an analysis of the entire energy system provides a deeper insight into all market processes and prevents potentially wrong preferences for particular parts of the system.

 

Research focuses at IIP (KIT)

  • Analyses of the utilisation of the transport grid, taking into account regional developments in the areas of expansion of renewable energies and conventional generation, electricity consumption and grid expansion
  • Further development of the model PERSEUS-NET with the aim of deriving economically reasonable, regional development paths for grid and generation

 

                 KonStGas