A framework for joint management of regional water-energy ... - Orbit

with the highest price, which can only be avoided through the inclusion of
additional constraints. In contrast, including a simple representation of the
power market into a hydro-economic model resulted in more realistic
reservoir operation policies that adapted to changing inflow conditions.
The effects of spatial aggregation on the analysis of water-power systems
were evaluated by comparing results from an aggregated and a partially
disaggregated model. The aggregated model, where all reservoirs were
represented as a single equivalent energy reservoir, provided valuable
insights into the management of water and power systems, but only at the
Peninsula scale. The disaggregated model revealed that optimal allocations
were achieved by managing water resources differently in each river basin
according to local inflow, storage capacity, hydropower productivity, and
irrigation demand and productivity. This highlights the importance of
considering spatial differences in this type of analysis.
The method was successfully used to assess linkages between the water and
the power systems of the Iberian Peninsula. The framework is flexible and
can potentially be used to model more aspects of the water-energy nexus, for
instance: the energy requirements of the transport sector and the impact of
biofuels on agriculture; the impact of reduced river discharge on cooling of
thermal power plants; or the impact of carbon capture and storage on water
resources. The increasing pressure of population growth, rising living
standards, and climate change on water, energy, land, and climate systems
will increase the need for integrated methods and models to assess the
linkages between these systems. The methodological framework proposed
here is a step forward in the development of these integrated tools.
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