UNDERSTANDING THE PRODUCTION BEHAVIOUR OF COMBINED HEAT AND POWER PLANTS : A mathematical programming approach

Sammanfattning: This thesis investigates how combined heat and power plants (CHP) produce electricity, with respect to several external factors including outdoor temperature and electricity prices. The purpose is to develop and evaluate a tool, with the aim to increase the understanding of CHP plants electricity production behaviour. This tool resulted in an optimisation model, developed in Python and using the CVXPY package. The objective of the model is to include a system of production units and optimise the production from these by minimising the production costs, while also considering technical constraints. Inspiration for the model was found from a literature review and from interviews with people working in the CHP sector, where the latter also provided historical production data used for validation. When comparing the modelled yearly electricity production with the historical data for the same year, it was found that the model deviated less than 10 percent for the two real district heating systems where the model was implemented. In conclusion, it is seen that the model behaves similar to the actual plants when looking at the electricity production; however, the behaviour of the model is slightly exaggerated with faster changes in the electricity production. Though, the results show that the developed model can be used to enhance the understanding of how CHP plants produce electricity.