Which power systems boost city resilience during power outages — and for how long?
Answering that question is one of the objectives of a report from American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE), Community Resilience Planning and Clean Energy Initiatives
The report rates 66 cities based on their resilience efforts, including investments in energy efficiency and renewable resources. The cities of Berkeley, California, Oakland, California, New York, San Francisco and Honolulu are among the cities identified as having strong resilience plans.
In the report, microgrids and solar plus storage systems are identified as providing high levels of resilience.
The report rates 66 city resilience plans selected from 100 Resilient Cities, an international program.
Diverse microgrids best
Climate change poses unprecedented challenges and disruptions, said the study. “In response, cities are actively planning to improve energy efficiency and promote renewable energy to make their neighborhoods more resilient in the face of climate change as well as other shocks and stresses.”
Microgrids that include solar, storage and diesel have a 90% chance of operating for about 3.5 days after an outage. That rate falls to 50% after 4.5 days, said the study.
Microgrids with only diesel generators don’t fare as well.
“Microgrids that only incorporate diesel generators have a less than 90% probability of surviving an outage that lasts more than two days and almost no chance of surviving an outage of three days or more because of uncertainties surrounding fuel resupply,” said the report.
Microgrid designs should include diverse resources – solar, storage, combined heat and power and diesel — to ensure that power supply is consistent, the report said.
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