Electrification Futures Study: Scenarios of Power System Evolution and Infrastructure Development for the United States

Through the Electrification Futures Study (EFS), the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) is exploring scenarios with and impacts of widespread electrification in the United States. This presentation will summarize results of two published studies, which sought to address two important questions: 1) What end-use electric technologies are available for the highest energy-consuming services today, and how might the technologies advance over time? 2) How might widespread electrification impact national and regional electricity demand and consumption patterns? In addition, this presentation will present preliminary results for new analysis that evaluates how the U.S. electricity system might need to transform to meet changes in demand from an electrified economy, and what role demand-side flexibility might play to support reliable grid operations under highly electrified scenarios. Preliminary results will be based on analysis in NREL's Regional Energy Deployment System (ReEDS) model, which is a capacity expansion model of the contiguous United States that relies on system-wide least-cost optimization to estimate the type and location of future generation and transmission capacity. A range of ReEDS scenarios will be presented, to provide a sense on the capacity expansion that could be required to meet new electricity demand from highly electrified end-use sectors, including buildings, transportation, and industry.