A New Transmission Tariff Allocation Model based on Bilevel Programming

This paper proposes a flow-based approach for the transmission tariff allocation problem based on the notions of long-run marginal cost (LRMC) and nodal exchange factors (NEFs). A worst-case power flow, expressed in terms of NEFs, is formulated to characterize the system state. Additionally, the NEFs optimal values are determined considering a specific criterion to compute tariffs. The resulting problem is formulated as a bilevel program. The upper level is a worst-case power flow that maximizes line flows taking into account the transmission tariffs computed in the lower level. The criterion considered in the lower level aims to minimize the variation range of transmission tariffs, which is particularly desirable to provide incentives for renewable sources installed far away from load centers. The resulting bilevel problem may have multiple solutions. Here, the uniqueness in tariffs is preserved by solving an alternative problem once both the generation dispatch and the variation range of transmission tariffs are known. Numerical results are provided for a 6-bus system and the IEEE 118-bus system