Short-Term Trading for a Concentrating Solar Power Producer in Electricity Markets

Concentrating solar power (CSP) plants with thermal energy storage (TES) are emerging renewable technologies with the advantage that TES decreases the uncertainty in the generation of CSP plants. This study introduces a stochastic mixed integer linear programming model, where the objective function is the maximization of the expected profit that can be obtained by selling the energy generated by the CSP plant in the day-ahead electricity market. The proposed model considers three main blocks of constraints, namely, renewable generator constraints, TES constraints, and electricity market constraints. The last category of constraints considers the penalties incurred due to positive or negative imbalances in the balancing market. A case study using data from the Spanish electricity market is introduced, described and analyzed in terms of trading of the CSP plant generation. The conclusions highlight the influence of TES capacity on the energy trading profile, the expected profits and the volatility (risk) in the trading decisions.