Long-term electricity demand forecasting for power system planning using economic, demographic and climatic variables

The stochastic planning of power production overcomes the drawback of deterministic models by accounting for uncertainties in the parameters. Such planning accounts for demand uncertainties by using scenario sets and probability distributions. However, in previous literature, different scenarios were developed by either assigning arbitrary values or assuming certain percentages above or below a deterministic demand. Using forecasting techniques, reliable demand data can be obtained and inputted to the scenario set. This article focuses on the long-term forecasting of electricity demand using autoregressive, simple linear and multiple linear regression models. The resulting models using different forecasting techniques are compared through a number of statistical measures and the most accurate model was selected. Using Ontario's electricity demand as a case study, the annual energy, peak load and base load demand were forecasted up to the year 2025. In order to generate different scenarios, different ranges in the economic, demographic and climatic variables were used. [Received 16 October 2007; Revised 31 May 2008; Revised 25 October 2008; Accepted I November 2008]