Case Study: Austin Energy gains approval for its 2035 resource plan with Ascend Analytics PowerSIMM

Austin Energy gains approval for its 2035 plan with Ascend Analytics after modeling 100 future scenarios

Austin Energy, one of the largest public power utilities in the U.S., faced the challenge of creating a new resource plan to balance rapid growth, evolving customer demands, and ambitious decarbonization goals amid increasing reliability risks and market changes. To address this, they engaged Ascend Analytics and its PowerSIMM stochastic modeling solution to identify achievable pathways and evaluate trade-offs between cost, emissions, and reliability.

Ascend Analytics implemented a comprehensive analysis using PowerSIMM to model four distinct portfolio scenarios, each with a different focus on emissions, cost, or reliability. The results provided Austin Energy's leadership and city council with the critical insights needed to make an informed decision, leading to the unanimous approval of their 2035 plan. The analysis highlighted key tradeoffs, confirming the importance of local resources for reliability and enabling Austin Energy to adopt a flexible approach that commits to 100% carbon-free generation by 2035.

Austin Energy