Using PyPSA-Earth to address energy systems modelling gaps in developing countries. A case study for Bolivia

Bolivia is a developing country in South America which is slowly starting its energy transition towards more renewable technologies. However, at this moment, Institutions in charge of regulating, operating, and planning the development of the sector are still working with “black box” (or licensed) models, which are costly and less transparent, and are highly dependent on external expertise to formulate national plans. A proper transition will arguably require endogenous know-how and resources to be sustainable, affordable, and sovereign for the country.
In this context, open-source energy models are increasingly used in Bolivia, mostly by academic and non-profit institutions. These are used to study alternative development scenarios, quantify environmental impacts and/or define potential techno-economic requirements.
Previous works have focused on the development of dispatch models that analyse the stability and operation over short-terms and on energy-balance models to study impacts over long-term scenarios. However, while operation and planning aspects are somewhat covered independently, the combination of both is still missing (i.e. high time and spatial resolution and long-term horizon perspectives).
To bridge this gap the PyPSA-Earth model was identified and used to derive a model specific for the Bolivian context using a dedicated workflow. The model is adapted to run and provide country-specific outputs regarding generation capacities, grid expansion and sector-specific demands, which are later compared with historical information to assess its accuracy and capabilities.
Modelling results provide inputs regarding the characteristics of the tool and quantify deviations of its outputs compared to the Bolivian system in 2020. Based on these, it is concluded that the flexibility of the model, combined with its transparent structure, show great potential for implementation.