ERCOT Nodal Aurora Dataset Release Webinar

This release was updated using the latest information available including but not limited to:

• ERCOT Carveout – All non-ERCOT information was removed from the database, resulting in enhanced performance.
• Long-Term Capacity Expansion – Added all necessary data and executed an Aurora exclusive long-term expansion plan until Year 2050. This enhancement includes Lithium-Ion Batteries as a New Resource option in Aurora. 
• Resource Update – Full resource update for current, planned, and retired resources, including locational data, capacity, and start/end dates.
• zREM Columns – Added CDR ID and CDR Name columns to Aurora, which allow one-to-one mapping to ERCOT’s Capacity, Demand and Reserves (CDR) Report, and enables data transparency. 
• Zonal Transmission Update – Zonal transmission limits have been updated based on the 2021 ERCOT SSWG powerflow case and validated based on a comparison to historical congestion.
• Nodal Transmission Update – Nodal transmission system has been updated with the 2022 to 2028 summer load flow/transmission cases delivered by the ERCOT Steady-State Working Group (SSWG) in June 2021. All eight years are included in this release.
• Nodal Contingencies – Over 8,000 N-1 contingencies included in the dataset, based on the 2021 ERCOT SSWG Planning Case Contingencies list.
• Interface Update - 11 new interface definitions and limits have been added in the dataset, based on the ERCOT 2021 Generic Transmission Constraints (GTC) Assumptions Report.
• Hub Update – Hub definitions have been updated, including the new Panhandle Hub.
• Generator Mapping - 99% of operational nameplate capacity has a high confidence mapping to a generator node in this data release. A custom informational column has been added to the ‘ERCOT Generator Mapping’ table, enabling users to easily identify the <1% with medium/low confidence mappings.
• Start Costs – Added as a separate cost to Aurora and removed from VO&M as it was implemented in the previous releases. 
• Fuel Prices – Used a price forecast from Natural Gas Intelligence (NGI) instead of blending multiple sources resulting in a longer, more granular, and more consistent forecast. 
• Fuel Structure – Simplified structure of fuel modeling in Aurora to reduce the number of records in the model and make it easier to perform fuel-level analysis. 
• Load – Updated historical and forecasted load based on weather zone data from ERCOT. Flat load calculations have been removed from this release.
• Financial Base Year – Updated the base year for all financial data so that is expressed in 2020 dollars (was 2012).

For full upgrade and product specifications, please find the database along with the release notes on the customer portal at https://portal.energyexemplar.com/