Reinventing Fire Electricity Sector Methodology

The document describes the use of NREL's Regional Energy Deployment System (ReEDS) and RMI's internal dispatch model to evaluate the technical feasibility and cost of four electricity scenarios: Maintain, Migrate, Renew, and Transform. It outlines spatial and temporal resolutions, generation cost assumptions based on learning curve theory, and specific modifications made to approximate distributed energy resources in the Transform case.

• RMI utilized two primary models for its analysis: the National Renewable Energy Laboratory's (NREL) Regional Energy Deployment System (ReEDS) for bulk power system technical feasibility and cost, and an internally developed hourly, least-cost dispatch model to analyze variable resources and distributed generation.
• The analysis evaluates four distinct scenarios for the U.S. electricity sector by 2050: 'Maintain' (business-as-usual), 'Migrate' (shift to nuclear and coal with carbon capture), 'Renew' (at least 80% centralized renewables), and 'Transform' (heavy reliance on distributed sources like rooftop solar and CHP).
• The ReEDS model employs a highly discretized spatial structure, including 3 major grid interconnects, 13 NERC subregions, 21 reserve-sharing groups, 134 balancing authorities, and 356 resource regions for wind and concentrated solar power (CSP).
• To project technology costs over 40 years, RMI applied learning curve theory, which posits that costs decrease as cumulative experience and deployment scale increase, creating a "virtuous cycle" of demand and production.
• For the Transform case, RMI exogenously specified several distributed resources to account for the distribution network's role: distributed wind (10% of total load by 2050), distributed solar (26% of total load by 2050), and industrial CHP (415 TWh annually by 2050).
• The methodology incorporates specific financial adjustments, including a risk adjustment factor added to the cost of equity and debt for all coal-fired technologies to account for potential carbon regulation.
• The ReEDS model's temporal resolution segments electricity demand into 17 timeslices per year, covering different times of day across four seasons, plus a specific slice for the 40 highest demand hours of summer peak.
• The RMI dispatch model follows a four-step process to determine the least-cost generation mix: applying energy efficiency measures, dispatching minimum generation and variable supply, utilizing hydropower and demand-shifting resources, and finally dispatching remaining dispatchable resources based on marginal cost.

APA

RMI (n.d.). Reinventing Fire Electricity Sector Methodology. https://rmi.org/app/uploads/2017/05/RMI_Document_Repository_Public-Reprts_Reinventing-Fire-Electricity-Sector-Methodology.pdf

Chicago

RMI. Reinventing Fire Electricity Sector Methodology. n.d. https://rmi.org/app/uploads/2017/05/RMI_Document_Repository_Public-Reprts_Reinventing-Fire-Electricity-Sector-Methodology.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |author=RMI |title=Reinventing Fire Electricity Sector Methodology |url=https://rmi.org/app/uploads/2017/05/RMI_Document_Repository_Public-Reprts_Reinventing-Fire-Electricity-Sector-Methodology.pdf |access-date=17 August 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{rmindreinventing, author = {{RMI}}, title = {{Reinventing Fire Electricity Sector Methodology}}, institution = {RMI}, url = {https://rmi.org/app/uploads/2017/05/RMI_Document_Repository_Public-Reprts_Reinventing-Fire-Electricity-Sector-Methodology.pdf}, urldate = {2026-08-17}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }