Unit-level power plant datasets

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Matthew Gidden

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Apr 19, 2021, 5:43:29 AM4/19/21
to openmod initiative, Jonas Hörsch, Tina Aboumahboub, Gaurav Ganti
Dear openmod community,

Many energy modellers have used the Platts World Electric Power Plants (WEPP) as a go-to unit-level power plant database. This is of course not an open dataset, but as openmod is also a community of practice, I thought it good to pose the following question to the group.

We recently communicated with Platts and discovered that they are no longer maintaining this dataset. I assume others have also run into this issue. I was curious, then, what others' plans are for identifying other primary datasets of global coverage of power plant units?

We have started to look around, having first reviewed a list on the openmod wiki [1]. GEO looks most potentially promising [2], but also is not updated frequently. We also dug into WRI's power plant database [3] and Global Energy Monitor [4]. Neither provide the same resolution and richness of Platts - i.e. plant vs unit-level.

In any case, we were wondering what this community thought - beyond what already exists on the wiki.

Cheers,
Matt


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Zane Selvans

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May 4, 2021, 1:05:58 PM5/4/21
to Matthew Gidden, openmod initiative, Jonas Hörsch, Tina Aboumahboub, Gaurav Ganti
Hey Matt,

Is there any documentation of the deprecation of the Platts dataset online? Searching around a little I'm finding links to, like, the Korean and Portuguese versions from March 2018, but the english page on the S&P site does seem to have vanished.  We (Catalyst) were on a call with folks from GEM the other day and they seemed to think that it was still being maintained. Might S&P be replacing it with something else, rather than continuing the Platts product line?

I don't know if it would be useful, but we've also been working with some folks at Carbon Tracker on creating a crosswalk table connecting the GEM IDs with our US-based Public Utility Data Liberation (PUDL) Project so that the two sets of data can be used together, though that would only help with rich data for the US fleet. Especially if the commercial worldwide dataset is being deprecated, it might be a good time to see whether there are other national energy system datasets which could be integrated with a global identifier scheme at the generator, unit, or plant level.

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Karl-K...@dlr.de

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May 10, 2021, 3:56:51 AM5/10/21
to zane.s...@catalyst.coop, matthew...@climateanalytics.org, openmod-i...@googlegroups.com

Hey all,

 

Just to take up the threads again: Recently I’ve been in touch with two different research groups who are purchasing access to the WEPP data base from S&P and none of them got the information that maintenance will be stopped. They rather got contracts for the next three years. However, these three years mean access and no updates later on. So at least promising updates and stopping maintenance at the same time appears a little contradicting.

 

And as we’re already talking, a question into the community, I’d really appreciate some opinions to the following question: What have been your main reasons for purchasing this database?

  • Details? (Which? From Matt’s email I learned it might be the spatial resolutions down to blocks. But what are the important parameters we need per block? For me it would be mainly the efficiencies which are hard to find elsewhere, right?)
  • Frequent updates?
  • World-wide coverage?
  • Consistency?
  • Ease of use?

Cheers,

Kiên

Robbie Morrison

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May 10, 2021, 4:33:54 AM5/10/21
to openmod-i...@googlegroups.com

Hi all

On the topic of accuracy, here is a modified screenshot from the mini‑workshop talk by Sylvain Quoilin on the Dispa‑SET Africa model.  Angola (AO) is on the far left.  The databases available to researchers understate the installed capacity by about 50% or more.

[power-plant-capacity-for-angola]
More here:

And here:

with best wishes, Robbie

To view this discussion on the web, visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/openmod-initiative/d157e99b91384ed08dd746850a9a8fc1%40dlr.de.
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north...@gmail.com

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Jun 28, 2021, 5:20:30 PM6/28/21
to openmod initiative
Dear all,

I wanted to share a final update of the global power plant database and inform you that we are (for now) stopping maintenance of the database as we are out of funding for this project.

We hope to continue updates and be able to scale the work if we can secure more resources. As you know the project is open source on GitHub, so if you want to contribute or maintain it (or know others who want to), please do so.

Updates:
1. The latest data update now includes [35,000 power plants](https://resourcewatch.org/data/explore?section=All+data&selectedCollection=&zoom=1.9051169170221909&lat=16.10628248199919&lng=15.002723085263431&pitch=0&bearing=0&basemap=light&labels=light&layers=%255B%257B%2522dataset%2522%253A%2522a86d906d-9862-4783-9e30-cdb68cd808b8%2522%252C%2522opacity%2522%253A1%252C%2522layer%2522%253A%25222a694289-fec9-4bfe-a6d2-56c3864ec349%2522%257D%255D&aoi=&page=1&sort=most-viewed&sortDirection=-1&topics=%255B%2522power_plant%2522%255D), with **3700 solar plants** being the main additions from our commercial partners. We also added **AI based annual generation for hydro, solar and wind power plant** . As we expand these methods to fossil fuel plants, this will deliver more **accurate measures of water withdrawal** and consumption and **pollutants to air** .
2. The [country level power sector profiles on RW](https://resourcewatch.org/dashboards/energy?country=CHN&tab=country) provide a nuanced picture of efficiency, electrification, exposure to climate hazards, electricity access and opportunities for investment in renewable electricity.
4. The dataset remains **by far the** **most accessed on RW** . For example, [researchers identified](https://essd.copernicus.org/preprints/essd-2020-280/)) that **1/2 of the largest NOx air pollution point sources** can be matched to power plants in our database and have built a [global power plant dispatch model](https://dataverse.harvard.edu/dataverse/PLEXOS-World) based on the data

In the future we have several visions that we would like to pursue with you, but we are also happy for you to continue to scale the work through the open source nature of the project.
We hope that in the future this work can be used to:
1. De-risk energy sector investments by MDBs and private investors by identifying current and future climate risks.
2. Internalize water risk and impacts on power sector infrastructure planning by combining it with Aqueduct water risk data.
3. Highlight what populations are most affected by power sector air pollution and enable better compliance monitoring.

Best,
Johannes Friedrich
**World Resources Institute**
<i>WRI is a global research organization that turns big ideas into action at the nexus of environment, economic opportunity and human well-being.</i>
Africa | Brazil | China | Europe | India | Indonesia | Mexico | United States

François Lacombe

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Jun 29, 2021, 7:22:14 AM6/29/21
to openmod initiative
Dear M Friedrich,

Le lun. 28 juin 2021 à 23:20, north...@gmail.com <north...@gmail.com> a écrit :
Dear all,

I wanted to share a final update of the global power plant database and inform you that we are (for now) stopping maintenance of the database as we are out of funding for this project.

Thank you for sharing this work with us.

Regarding updating work and funding issues, why didn't your team chose a collaborative platform to produce this final version of the dataset and let people making updates?
A project like OpenStreetMap aims to record every generator around the world and it may worth a try as it already knows 1 300 000 of them

This is my 2 cents, all the best

François Lacombe
 

Matteo De Felice

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Jun 30, 2021, 9:44:59 AM6/30/21
to openmod initiative
The WRI database is already on github: https://github.com/wri/global-power-plant-database
However, they haven't updated it with the version 1.3 (on the website), so the repository is outdated. 

François Lacombe

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Jul 1, 2021, 3:43:47 PM7/1/21
to openmod initiative
Le mer. 30 juin 2021 à 15:45, Matteo De Felice <matteo....@gmail.com> a écrit :
The WRI database is already on github: https://github.com/wri/global-power-plant-database
However, they haven't updated it with the version 1.3 (on the website), so the repository is outdated. 

Given problem is github is a pretty good data warehouse but a poor editing software.
You may be forced to add util scripts with each database you provide there to edit and check upon a very particular set of features.


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