Swiss power grid tested for stress

(CONNECT) Researchers at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich(ETH) and the Zurich University of Applied Sciences(ZHAW) in Winterthur have carried out a simulation to investigate the dependence of the national electricity grid on foreign imports. According to a press release, the teams tested various shock scenarios for a climate-neutral Switzerland in 2050. The aim is to show how to react in the event of drastic restrictions on gas and electricity imports from abroad.

As a basic assumption, the researchers set a demand of 76 terawatt hours for the year 2050, 45 percent of which will be produced from imports and hydropower and the rest from domestic solar and wind power plants.

The simulations showed that a drastic reduction in electricity of up to 70 percent can be achieved from domestic sources. Major gas outages could be replaced by liquid fuels. According to the study, nuclear energy would only have to be used in the unlikely event of a total loss of all imports every two years. "Only in this unrealistic scenario would the very high investment costs of new nuclear power plants be offset by their relatively low operating costs," says ZHAW energy researcher Ali Darudi.

"The less frequently there are drastic restrictions on electricity trading with other countries of 70 percent or more, the more efficiently these can be managed with technologies that have high operating costs but low investment costs," Jonas Savelsberg from the ETH Energy Science Center is quoted as saying in the press release. ce/ww