Analysis of the value for unit commitment of improved load forecasts (original) (raw)

Load forecast errors can yield suboptimal unit commitment decisions. The economic cost of inaccurate forecasts is assessed by a combination of forecast simulation, unit Commitment optimization, and economic dispatch modeling for several different costs and, perhaps, maintenance expenses,. expensive power may have been purchased which wasn't needed, or a profitable opportunity to sell bulk power have heen soumed. I ~~~~ ~ ~~~~~~ and eenerator characteiistics: for the systems considered here, a voked, annoying consumers and lowering revenue. reduction of 1% in mean absolute percentage error (MAPE) decreases variable generation costs by approximately 0.1 %-0.3% when MAPE is in the range of 3%-5%. These values are broadly consistent with the results of a survey of 19 utilities, using estimates obtained by simpler methods. A conservative estimate is that a 1 % reduction in forecasting error for a 10,000 MW utilily can save up to $1.6 million annually.