Sector Coupling: Concepts, State-of-the-art and Perspectives

Sector coupling has recently gained increased attention, bringing new complexity into infrastructure investment decisions but also new opportunities for its smart operation. In a multi-energy system the benefits of an investment in one system may spread over other connected sectors, calling for new metrics when evaluating the cost-benefit analysis (CBA) and for widening scenarios of investment decisions to alternative solutions in the cross-energy system which can be more economical.

Sector coupling brings new challenges such as: amount and shape of electric demand growth with electrification of heating and transport; how much distribution-grid based system reinforcement is needed to accommodate the charging of Electric Vehicles (EV) or electricity needs of Heat Pumps (HP), and when in the coming decades or years these devices should be installed; whether the costs of electrolysers for power-to-gas decreases significantly , and how that affects the economics of electricity vs. gas transmission and distribution.

There are great expectations about the role of sector coupling in the achievement of a swift, economical efficient green transition with a high security of supply, but it is unclear to which extent current technologies can provide on this agenda.

This ETIP SNET White Paper aims to elaborate on those questions, starting with clarification of concepts and assessment of potential impacts.