[Feature Request]: Compute the Levelized cost of energy (LCOE)

[jarsarasty]

Is there an existing issue for this?

• [X] I have searched the existing issues

What would your feature do ?

Calculate the Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE) for each heat source asset. This metric indicates the cost per unit of heat delivered based on discounted CAPEX and OPEX over the technical lifetime of the asset. If an asset's technicalLifetime is not provided, a default or user-provided technicalLifetime for the network should be used for the calculation. A recommended default technicalLifetime value of 30 years can be defined for the network. Similarly, a default discount rate should be used for the calculation if the user does not provide one for the asset.

This feature request is linked to this discussion.

Proposed workflow

• Users specify the technical life and discount rate if they have specific values they want to use. Otherwise, default values are used for the calculation.
• After a successful optimization run, display the LCOE for each heat source asset in the web front-end, allowing users to compare the economics of different assets.

Additional information

1. Agree with develpoment team where the calculation should take place (optimizer and simulator or KPI calculator)
2. Coordinate with front-end team LCOE attribute to be displayed.

[jarsarasty]

Estimate effort and value in next meeting.

[jarsarasty]

• MapEditor: ESDL Analyzer will be available soon and will allow to retrieve KPIs per asset.

• Frontend: Ensure that discount rate and technical lifetime per asset type are provided by user or default values per asset type are used in calculation. Default values could be read from energy system database. Input table would make it easier to define inputs per asset (MapEditor). Update in TPG frontend would be necessary to provide technical life via input table. Warning if input technical life or discount rates are not provided. CAPEX could be displayed as stacked bars (should be part of another feature request).

• Technical life and discount rate inputs are used by the optimizer and in the calculation of other KPIs. Therefore, the front-end implementation is of high value to the design toolkit.

• In general, the front-end implementation requires little effort.

• Backend approach to be defined by the design team: the optimizer already includes some KPI calculations, and asset attributes are accessed directly for this calculation (before the ESDL file with the outputs is created).