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PV LCOE in Europe 2014-30
Abstract
It has been shown that the PV module price will most likely to be halved again and BoS price will decrease by more than 35% by 2030, leading to an overall PV system CAPEX reduction of about 45%. It must be noted that this development does not require any major technology breakthroughs but is a natural cause from continuing efforts in reducing materials use, impoving efficiency and developing manufacturing processes. At the same time, PV system OPEX is expected to decrease by 30%. PV LCOE will decrease by 30-50% from 2014 to 2030, depending on the volume growth and learning rate. Cost of capital is by far more significant than CAPEX or OPEX: a 8% percentage point increase in real WACC will double the LCOE. It is the most urgent task for the solar industry to improve the bankability of PV, but at the same time for the policy makers to create a stable environment for investments, in order to decrease the cost of capital and thus the LCOE of PV.
Residential and commercial PV electricity is already competitive with retail market electricity in all selected countries. Parity with wholesale market electricity will be reached by 2030 almost everywhere. There is every reason to believe that this development will continue after 2030 because there is still a huge improvement potential in various PV technologies. Figure 13 gives the PV LCOE for a 1 p ground-mounted system until 2050 assuming that the annual market would stay at the 200 GWp level, learning rate at 20%, and module efficiency improves 0.4 percentage points per year from 2030 to 2050. This would mean that global cumulative PV capacity would be 5700 GWp in 2050 and average module efficiency about 30%. PV system price would decrease to about third from 2014 and OPEX is assumed to be halved. It can be seen that in Spain the LCOE in 2050 would be about 20 €/MWh and in the UK and Sweden below 40 €/MWh with a 5% real WACC, or about 60% less in 2050 compared with 2014. It can be concluded that PV will probably be the cheapest form of electricity generation in most countries in the coming decades.
Supplementary resource (1)
... Obviously, system size has an impact on the share of CAPEX and OPEX in the LCOE, which is shown for utility-scale PV in Section 4. The weighted average cost of capital (WACC) used in the LCOE calculation is the single most important input parameter, more important than CAPEX and comparable to yield. 25 In this paper, WACC is varied in order to evaluate the full range of PV LCOE with different kind of investors and projects. WACC for utility-scale PV can be as low as 2.5%, as reported for the case of Germany. ...
... In a previous paper by Vartiainen et al 25 Nominal WACC can be defined as ...
... Another challenge is that the solar PV industry is developing so fast that it is difficult to forecast even the near future price development. As an example, Figure 15 shows a comparison of a couple of fairly recent EUPVTP/ETIP PV 25 sensitivity analysis that the cumulative installed PV capacity in 2050 ...
Solar photovoltaics (PV) is already the cheapest form of electricity generation in many countries and market segments. Market prices of PV modules and systems have developed so fast that it is difficult to find reliable up to date public data on real PV capital (CAPEX) and operational expenditures (OPEX) on which to base the levelised cost of electricity (LCOE) calculations. This paper projects the future utility‐scale PV LCOE until 2050 in several European countries. It uses the most recent and best available public input data for the PV LCOE calculations and future projections. Utility‐scale PV LCOE in 2019 in Europe with 7% nominal weighted average cost of capital (WACC) ranges from 24 €/MWh in Malaga to 42 €/MWh in Helsinki. This is remarkable since the average electricity day‐ahead market price in Finland was 47 €/MWh and in Spain 57 €/MWh in 2018. This means that PV is already cheaper than average spot market electricity all over Europe. By 2030, PV LCOE will range from 14 €/MWh in Malaga to 24 €/MWh in Helsinki with 7% nominal WACC. This range will be 9 to 15 €/MWh by 2050, making PV clearly the cheapest form of electricity generation everywhere. Sensitivity analysis shows that apart from location, WACC is the most important input parameter in the calculation of PV LCOE. Increasing nominal WACC from 2 to 10% will double the LCOE. Changes in PV CAPEX and OPEX, learning rates, or market volume growth scenarios have a relatively smaller impact on future PV LCOE. Utility‐scale PV LCOE in Europe with 7% nominal WACC ranges from 24 €/MWh in Malaga to 42 €/MWh in Helsinki in 2019 and will be 9‐15 €/MWh by 2050, making PV clearly the cheapest form of electricity generation. With location, WACC is the most important LCOE input parameter: increasing nominal WACC from 2 to 10% doubles the LCOE. Changes in PV CAPEX and OPEX, learning rates, or market volume growth have a relatively smaller impact on future LCOE.
... These costs decrease with improvements in the efficiency of the modules. OPEX costs are expected to reduce by 15% by the year 2030 [7]. It has also been suggested that the standardization of manufacturing practices will further contribute a drop of 15% in the same year leading to a total decline of 30% in OPEX costs which further makes up $14/kW per annum for systems holding capacity up to 1 MW and $10.5/kW per annum for multi-megawatts systems [7]. ...
... OPEX costs are expected to reduce by 15% by the year 2030 [7]. It has also been suggested that the standardization of manufacturing practices will further contribute a drop of 15% in the same year leading to a total decline of 30% in OPEX costs which further makes up $14/kW per annum for systems holding capacity up to 1 MW and $10.5/kW per annum for multi-megawatts systems [7]. ...
Energy deficiency in different parts of the world is not only adversely affecting the quality of life of individuals but is also compromising the overall development of these areas. Pakistan is one of the energy-deficient countries of the world having high energy demand but less energy production, resulting in a consequent energy deficit of 2500 MW (Mega-Watt). Considering which, the current environmental and energy profile of Pakistan highlights the need for the country to shift to renewable energy sources to increase the production of clean energy. The availability of sufficient water bodies and suitable climate and terrain throughout the year makes Pakistan an extremely favorable region for the implementation of FPV (Floating Photovoltaic) technology to meet its energy demands. The current study proposes the prospects of implementing FPV technology in Pakistan. Also, it presents detailed discussion on environmental, economic, and technical aspects of FPV technology justifying its potential for Pakistan and other countries with similar regional profiles to adapt to the said technology.
... The LCOE in 2030 could be ranging from 25 to 40 €/MWh for PV (Kost et al., 2018) and 30-50 €/MWh for wind (IRENA, 2019). Estimations provide LCOE values of 20 €/MWh by 2050 when using PV technology (Vartiainen et al., 2015). A very low ...
Capture and utilization of industrial CO2 emissions into low-carbon fuels is a promising alternative to store renewable electricity into chemical vectors while decarbonizing the economy. This work evaluates the viability pathways of producing synthetic natural gas (SNG) by direct CO2 electroreduction (ER) in Power-To-Synthetic Natural Gas electrolyzers (PtSNG). We perform an ex-ante techno-economic (TEA) and life cycle analysis (LCA) for a 2030 framework in Europe. ER performance is varied in defined scenarios and assessed using a built-in process model of the PtSNG system, revealing uncharted limitations and benchmarks to achieve. Results show that substitution of fossil natural gas with renewable SNG could avoid more than 1 kg CO2e/kg SNG under moderate ER conditions when using low-carbon electricity (< 60 kg CO2e/MWh). SNG profitability for 2030 would rely on: i) higher CH4 current densities (800–1000 mA/cm²), ii) improvements in energy efficiency (higher than 60%), and iii) valorization of the anodic product or additional carbon incentives. Our study proves that if market and technology evolve appropriately in the coming years, the SNG by CO2 ER may be a mid-term climate change mitigation technology, among others.
... As it turns out, there is no universal indicator for assessing the economic situation of a given country in the context of obtaining solar energy from photovoltaic cells (Bódis et al. 2019). In this case, the most common expression is Levelized Cost of Electricity (or Energy), LCOE (Vartiainen et al. 2015). This indicator can be calculated using the Eq. ...
Nowadays, one of the basic requirements for thermally upgraded buildings involves limitation in CO 2 emission even by over 90%. To fulfil these criteria, it is necessary to use alternative energy sources and photovoltaics constitutes a reasonable option for this. This paper addresses an analysis of the efficiency and profitability of a photovoltaic system located in the geometric center of Europe-Poland, where the intensity of solar irradiation is not very high compared to other European countries. The difference of total solar radiation density between Poland and Malta is 49.2%, from analysis based on SolarGIS base. The PV Lighthouse calculator was used for global power density and photon current examination for a Polish city and locations of the highest and the lowest solar radiation values, Malta and Finland, respectively. This case study concerns a thermally upgraded building; a gas boiler was replaced by a heat pump supported by an off-grid PV system. To achieve a reduction in CO 2 emission of 90%, it is necessary to install 182 PV cells, which generates high investment costs. An investment is entirely profitable with 70% of funding with Simple Pay Back Time, SPBT~7 years although Net Present Value, NPV>0; Internal Rate of Return, IRR=10.6%.
... The main input data are the investment costs, the annual operation and maintenance (O&M) costs (including the fuel costs when applicable) and the annual electricity production net of the annual components' degradation. The basic LCOE formula for the PV plants is that the one proposed in Fraunhofer 8 that can be extended as in Vartiainen et al., 9 where the annual electricity production is calculated based on the utilization and degradation rates, while the O&M expenditure is discounted with the nominal weighted average cost of capital (WACC) and the annual electricity production by the real WACC. This LCOE formulation is the following: ...
This study aims at introducing a new metric to evaluate the production costs of photovoltaic plants that includes the impacts of adding them in the existing energy system. In other words, the levelized cost of electricity concept is enlarged to incorporate the so‐called integration costs. They consider the costs of reinforcing the grid infrastructure to accept the increase of variable renewable sources production and the effects on the operating conditions of the existing fossil fuel power plants. These costs are applied to the utility‐scale photovoltaic plants to analyse how their market parity and profitability would change in the future if a more systematic approach is used to evaluate their production costs. Moreover, a bottom‐up energy system model performing an operational optimization is introduced and coupled with a genetic algorithm to perform the expansion capacity optimization. This model is used to study the effects on the utility‐scale photovoltaic plants' dispatchability if the integration costs are included. The Italian energy system and photovoltaic market projected to the year 2030 are taken as reference. The results of the market parity highlight that its achievement will not be compromised when the integration costs are considered, mainly thanks to the strong decrease of the investment costs expected in the future years. The results of the optimization underline that the future role of photovoltaic plants in the energy mix with low CO2 emissions will not be significantly affected, even when these additional costs are applied as annual costs.
... The lifetime of PV converter is assumed the same as the PV system as there are no relevant studies yet on this specific topic to the best knowledge of the authors. The annual PV maintenance cost is assumed to be 18 £/kWp as per [38], that is the maintenance cost per kW of PV peak or maximum installed capacity for each year of its lifetime. As mentioned earlier, 50% of PV generation in the UK is assumed to be exported to the grid regardless of the actual grid exchange. ...
Developments in photovoltaic (PV) technologies and mass production have resulted in continuous reduction of PV systems cost. However, concerns remain about the financial feasibility for investments in PV systems, which is facing a global shrinking of government support. This work evaluates the investment attractiveness of rooftop PV installations and the impact of energy storage systems (ESS), using the UK as a case study. The evaluation considers the location of installation, the temporal evolution of the supporting policies, local energy consumption, electricity price and cost of investment at different years. Furthermore, the use of electric vehicles (EVs) as an alternative to ESS for complementing PV systems is also investigated. Optimization techniques are employed to schedule ESS and EV energy exchange in order to maximise the investment return. The results show that the net present value of PV systems in the UK has dropped from £28,650 in 2011 to £1,200 in 2017, due to declining government support towards PV technologies. It further shows that by incorporating ESS with PV systems, the benefit in 2017 can be increased by 46%. Conversely, employing the EV as energy storage would not bring additional benefits, considering the associated battery degradation and the current battery manufacturing cost.
... The financial and technical assumptions are mostly taken from the European Commission [8], but also from other sources [37][38][39][40][41][42][43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50]. The financial and technical assumptions for all power and heat generation capacities, storage, transmission and bringing technologies and fuels with respective references are presented in the Appendix A (Tables A1 and A2). ...
Transition towards 100% renewable energy supply is a challenging aim for many regions in the world. Even in regions with excellent availability of wind and solar resources, such factors as limited availability of flexible renewable energy resources, low flexibility of demand, and high seasonality of energy supply and demand can impede the transition. All these factors can be found for the case of Kazakhstan, a mostly steppe country with harsh continental climate conditions and an energy intensive economy dominated by fossil fuels. Results of the simulation using the LUT Energy System Transition modelling tool show that even under these conditions, the power and heat supply system of Kazakhstan can transition towards 100% renewable energy by 2050. A renewable-based electricity only system will be lower in cost than the existing fossil-based system, with levelised cost of electricity of 54 €/MWh in 2050. The heat system transition requires installation of substantial storage capacities to compensate for seasonal heat demand variations. Electrical heating will become the main source of heat for both district and individual heating sectors with heat cost of about 45 €/MWh and electricity cost of around 56 €/MWh for integrated sectors in 2050. According to these results, transition towards a 100% renewable power and heat supply system is technically feasible and economically viable even in countries with harsh climatic conditions.
... There is no agreed definition of economic potential for assessing renewable energy technologies. Since, broadly speaking, the economic viability is dependent on substituting an existing source of electricity with that from a PV system, a commonly used approach [27] is compare the LCOE with current electricity prices. The LCOE parameter, as calculated using Equation (1), is based on a net present value approach and provides a unit cost estimate, taking account of the location-specific performance, the initial investment, the operating costs and the discount rate. ...
Rooftop solar photovoltaic (PV) systems can make a significant contribution to Europe's energy transition. Realising this potential raises challenges at policy and electricity system planning level. To address this, the authors have developed a geospatially explicit methodology using up-to-date spatial information of the EU building stock to quantify the available rooftop area for PV systems. To do this, it combines satellite-based and statistical data sources with machine learning to provide a reliable assessment of the technical potential for rooftop PV electricity production with a spatial resolution of 100 m across the European Union (EU). It estimates the levelised cost of electricity (LCOE) using country-specific parameters and compares it to the latest household electricity prices. The results show that the EU rooftops could potentially produce 680 TWh of solar electricity annually (representing 24.4% of current electricity consumption), two thirds of which at a cost lower than the current residential tariffs. Country aggregated results illustrate existing barriers for cost-effective rooftop systems in countries with low electricity prices and high investment interest rates, as well as provide indications on how to address these.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1364032119305179
... On the other hand, FiTs for PV production have been progressively reduced in many countries such as Germany, Spain and the UK in line with the decrease of PV prices and/ or achievement of capacity objectives. The current levelised cost of PV generation is below 10 USDcents/kWh (7.7 £/kWh) across continental Europe for residential rooftop installations [4]. In Switzerland, PV penetration targets established by the Swiss Federal government in 2008 for 2030 were already achieved by 2015 and since then the government has been encouraging all owners of new installations to use their PV electricity for self-consumption (i.e., consuming PV electricity in the dwelling and reducing the purchase of electricity from the utility companies) and to sell the surplus to the grid. ...
Batteries are expected to play an important role in the transition to decarbonised energy systems by enabling the further penetration of renewable energy technologies while assuring grid stability. However, their hitherto high capital costs is a key barrier for their further deployment. In order to improve their economic viability, batteries could provide several applications offering revenues. The techno-economic evaluation of batteries simultaneously serving several applications has proven to be challenging due to the trade-offs between energy and power applications. Focusing on residential batteries, we develop an optimisation method for designing optimal value propositions and we test it for four different applications both individually and jointly: PV self-consumption, demand load-shifting, avoidance of PV curtailment and demand peak shaving. Our results show that the combination of all applications currently helps batteries to get closer to profitability, from a net present value (NPV) per unit of capital expenditure (CAPEX) of -0.63±0.04 for PV self-consumption only to -0.36±0.10, with the combination of demand peak-shaving and PV self-consumption adding most value (0.21±0.04). We also find that the annual household’s electricity consumption determines the value of energy storage applications. The proposed method allow us to classify storage applications as complementary and substitutive depending on whether their combined application increases their economic attractiveness or not. These results thus offer valuable insight for stakeholders interested in the deployment of energy storage in combination with energy efficiency, heat pumps and electric vehicles such as consumers, utility companies and policy makers.
... It also shows that the smallest storage system considered in this study would be profitable at a final price of 576 Euros/usable capacity. This price is at close reach looking at learning curves of storage shown in [66] (year 2022 for residential Li-ion battery system price with a learning curve of 15%). ...
This paper presents a new method for the planning of photovoltaic systems in the early architectural design. The method finds capacity and position of a photovoltaic system over the envelope of a building by means of optimization. The input consists in: geometry of the building, surrounding shadings, local weather, hourly electric demand, unitary costs of the system and benefits for the production of electricity (sold or self-consumed). In the input there are known values (e.g. PV installation costs [€/kWp] or present costs for the electricity [€/kWh]) and unknown ones (e.g. degradation rate [%/year], maintenance costs [€/kWp year] or discount rate [%/year]). The optimization is performed using the expected value out of a set of parametric scenarios generated by the unknown input values. The results show that, if capacity and position of the system are tailored on its aggregated electric demand, a large penetration of photovoltaic electricity is profitable at current prices without incentives or valorization from the grid. The optimization performed with an arbitrary set of electric storages shows how the presence of storage fosters a higher optimal capacity for the PV system. This method has the potential to hugely expand the installation of urban photovoltaic.
... LCOE is defined to be the average generation cost, i.e., including all the costs involved in supplying PV at the point of connection to the grid. PV LCOE for a ground-mounted 1 MWp system varies currently from about 55·10 −3 e kWh −1 in Spain to about 95·10 −3 e kWh −1 in the UK ( Vartiainen et al., 2015). Addi- tionally, recent estimations carried out in multiple countries have determined that the price of renewable electricity (PV solar) could be as low as 0.02 e kWh −1 in 2030 ( Haegel et al., 2017). ...
This paper focuses on the study of the environmental and economic feasibility of the formic acid (FA) synthesis by means of electrochemical reduction (ER) of carbon dioxide (CO2) with special emphasis on the cathode lifetime. The study has used a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) approach in order to obtain the environmental indicators as Global Warming Potential (GWP) and Abiotic Depletion (ADP) (both elements and fossil resources ADPs). The values of the indicators obtained in the assessment were representative of the Carbon Footprint (CF) and resource savings of this fabrication process. The commercial/conventional process for FA production was used as benchmark. The novelty of the study is the incorporation into the Life Cycle Inventory (LCI) of those materials and chemicals that are used in the fabrication of an ER cell, and in particular in the cathode. Hence, the lifetime of the cathode was used as a main parameter. The results obtained for a baseline case demonstrated that cathode lifetimes over 210 h would be enough to neglect the influence of the cathode fabrication from an environmental perspective. A first approach to the utility costs of CO2 ER process was also proposed in the study. Cost of utilities ranged between 0.16 € kg ⁻¹ and 1.40 € kg⁻¹ of FA in an ER process compared with 0.21 € kg⁻¹ and 0.43 € kg⁻¹ of FA in the conventional process depending on the market prices. This study demonstrated that the ER-based process could be competitive under future conditions if a reasonable electrocatalytic performance (in terms of cell voltage, current density, and faradaic efficiency) is achieved within a reasonable medium or long-term horizon. The results obtained aim to provide useful insights for decision-makers on the future developments within a decarbonized chemical industry.
... In short, they evaluated the final product, but not each individual technology, and region-specific strength and issue. Various information sources are available for the economic evaluation of PV technology, including market analysis reports based on actual sales prices (IEA-PVPS, 2016), manufacturers' annual reports, technical development goals (ITRPV, 2017), future perspectives (Vartiainen et al., 2015), and reports on the evaluation of current costs (BNEF, Chung et al., 2015). It is suitable for evaluating actual prices, price differences in each region, and price trends. ...
Global warming is a worldwide problem that requires an international strategy to ensure compatibility of economic growth and overcoming climate change. Although global use of low-carbon technology is a solution, consideration of economic consequences is important to promote future technology development and use. Photovoltaic (PV) solar power system is a promising renewable technology that carries climate mitigation expectations. We conducted a value chain analysis to evaluate the economic effect of the manufacture and use of silicon PV solar power system worldwide. We quantitatively reviewed the flow of manufacturing and installation for cells, modules, and facilities (e.g., inverters) related to Japan, and estimated the retrospectively induced economic costs for Japan and other developed and developing countries. Material, equipment, labor, utility, transportation, and business operation costs were studied in detail at different manufacturing and installation stages. This unique evaluation methodology quantified economic costs from an international perspective. The retrospectively induced economic effect of 2014 PV solar power system sales in Japan (induced by cell module and system production by Japanese companies and increased domestic use) was 1.6 trillion Japanese yen worldwide, of which 63% was attributable to Japan, 10% to other developed countries, and 27% to developing countries. The economic effect in Japan in terms of equipment cost and installation stage was 37% and 71% of the total effect, which was particularly high. Further technical improvement, cost reduction, and improvement in inverter and manufacturing equipment reliability are important to capitalize Japan's strengths. Currently, Japan's involvement in the manufacturing of cells and modules is small. Therefore, both technical innovation and cost reduction are necessary. We present new methodology to obtain inputs into policy development for further research, development, and technology diffusion.
... Over the years, the FITs have been reduced and even terminated in many countries, which has increased the competition and reduced OPEX. C. Breyner et al. [12] (2015) set to 20 €/kW/year for plants from residential-scale up to 1 MW ground-mounted systems, and 15 €/kW/year for multiwatts ground-mounted systems. Similar values are reported by NREL in February 2017 [24]. ...
Solar photovoltaic is one of the most well-established forms of renewable energy, currently showing signs of a significant level of maturity. Its production prices in 2016 reached for the first time the level of those of onshore wind, and, in most countries, are permanently lower than those of conventional energies. Furthermore, there is evidence that, in the next ten years, the global weighted average installed cost of utility-scale solar photovoltaics (PV) could fall by around 60%.As it is a very modular technology, systems may range from very small scales up to utility-scale power generation facilities, allowing for a wide scope of applications.The exhaustion of global terrestrial resources and the need to avoid the occupation of large farmlands with ground-based solar plants has encouraged the search for alternative solutions. Such is the case of floating photovoltaic energy systems, which recently started attracting the attention of both the research community and utilities. Until a few years ago, this type of solution, which has the potential to improve PV systems efficiency while, at the same time, addressing the space usage issues, was hardly regarded as economically viable. The work consists in a breakdown of solar photovoltaic technology and economics, in the study of economic viability of different floating PV configurations, and in a simulation of a floating PV system on a Portuguese dam. For this purpose, a simulation model has been designed to compute the levelized cost of energy and to carry on sensitivity analyses on the most cost-influencing aspects of the power plant.
... Narges Ghorbani et al. / Energy Procedia 135 (2017)[23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32][33][34][35][36] ...
This work presents a pathway for the transition to a 100% renewable energy (RE) system by 2050 for Iran. An hourly resolved model is simulated to investigate the total power capacity required from 2015 to 2050 in 5-year time steps to fulfil the electricity demand for Iran. In addition, shares of various RE resources and storage technologies have been estimated for the applied years, and all periods before in 5-year time steps. The model takes the 2015 installed power plant capacities, corresponding lifetimes and total electrical energy demand to compute and optimize the mix of RE plants needed to be installed to achieve a 100% RE power system by 2050. The optimization is carried out on the basis of assumed costs and technological status of all energy technologies involved. Moreover, the role of storage technologies in the energy system, and integration of the power sector with desalination and non-energetic industrial gas sectors are examined. Our results reveal that RE technologies can fulfil all electricity demand by the year 2050 at a price level of about 41 - 47 €/MWhel depending on the sectorial integration. Moreover, the combination of solar PV and battery storage is found as a least cost solution after 2030 for Iran. If the capacity in 2050 would have been invested for the cost assumptions of 2050 the cost would be 32 - 40 €/MWhel, depending on the sectorial integration, which can be expected for the time beyond 2050.
... The importance of this difference is vital in the solar field. Many financial analyses have shown that a 5% increase in the cost of debt can increase the share in the PV electricity costs between 18% and 45% [7,10,11]. The aforementioned discrepancy coupled with differences in electricity market prices, has hampered SPVS investment in the NMS. ...
Local urban planning has become concerned over clean energy technologies development on greenfield land that may lead to competition in land use. Solar photovoltaic systems on agriculture land is an indicative example of this disputed strategy. At the same time closed landfills and their post-closure management pose environmental, economic and land value concerns at the local authorities. In the present work we analyse the concept of solar photovoltaic system installation in closed landfills. This practice has already received attention and the present article provides an overview of existing installations as well as assessment of the existing potential. Moreover, it introduces a methodology that geoanalyses closed sites, evaluates them in a hierarchical manner and suggests the appropriate PV technology for each site. The methodology has been applied in Hungary and revealed that 450 MWp of solar could be deployed in Hungarian closed landfills. EU-level projections provide estimations for the potential to range around 13 GWp. Such an approach may become a forefront instrument in the local, bottom-up sustainability policy planning.
... It is quite likely that the market volumes for self-consumption business cases will grow in the future as the trend of falling LCOE of DG and BSS continues. The LCOE of PV, for example, are assumed to decrease by 30-50 % from 2014 to 2030 [132]. ...
Due to the increasing penetration of fluctuating distributed generation electrical grids require reinforcement, in order to secure a grid operation in accordance with given technical specifications. This grid reinforcement often leads to over-dimensioning of the distribution grids. Therefore, traditional and recent advances in distribution grid planning are analysed and possible alternative applications with large scale battery storage systems are reviewed. The review starts with an examination of possible revenue streams along the value chain of the German electricity market. The resulting operation strategies of the two most promising business cases are discussed in detail, and a project overview in which these strategies are applied is presented. Finally, the impact of the operation strategies are assessed with regard to distribution grid planning.
... The actualization of the cost of money was not considered in this calculation. The formula for NPV was derived from [14]. ...
BiPV (Building Integrated Photovoltaics) are complex architectural systems based on the concept of multifunctionality[1]. Once a specific system is chosen, they need a fine tuning of its parameters to be a desirable option. Effects such as energy yield, cost analysis, impact on the energy demand of the building and on the internal comfort should be optimized. Despite a growing number of building performance analysis tools, the performance optimization tools are still in short supply[2]. In this paper a new method is shown for the optimization of fixed BiPV overhangs taking into account the electricity production and impact on the building energy demand for heating and cooling. The case study for the optimization is a block of of three high rise residential buildings in a contemporary urban environment.
... This is due to a steep positive learning rate associated with solar PV that shows overall cost reductions as capacity is increased, unlike technologies such as hydro or nuclear power, which tend to show a negative learning rate [16]. Using Stockholm as an analogue for Helsinki, a recent report suggests that levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) of solar PV could be below 40 €/MWhe by 2050 [17]. This is based on a real weighted average cost of capital (WACC) of 5%, learning rate of 20% and solar PV module efficiency improvements of 0.4% per year from 2030 to 2050. ...
There are several barriers to achieving an energy system based entirely on renewable energy (RE), not the least of which is doubt that high capacities of solar PV can be feasible due to long, cold and dark Finnish winters. Technologically, several energy storage options can facilitate high penetrations of solar PV (up to 29 TWhe, or 16% of annual electricity production) and other variable forms of RE. These options include electric and thermal storage systems in addition to a robust role of Power-toGas (PtG) technology. Approximately 45% of electricity produced from solar PV was used directly over the course of the year, which shows the relevance of storage. In terms of public policy, several mechanisms are available to promote various forms of RE. However, many of these are contested in Finland by actors with vested interests in maintaining the status quo rather than by those without faith in RE conversion or storage technologies. These vested interests must be overcome before a zero fossil carbon future can begin.
With the increasing electric vehicle (EV) penetration, there arises an immediate need for charging infrastructure. In the future, the electrification of transportation will reduce the requirement of existing fuel stations, thereby rendering them obsolete. However, they are best suited to cater to the charging demand of EVs as the drivers are accustomed to the locations and the incremental cost of providing this service will be lower. In this paper, we propose a novel methodology to assess the techno-economic feasibility of retrofitting an existing fuel station with EV charging infrastructure also known as Electric Vehicle Supply Equipment (EVSE). To further enhance the value proposition, the potential of integrating Battery Energy Storage System (BESS) with EV charging infrastructure, which results in the reduction of grid connection costs, is studied. The sustainability of the proposed system is improved with additional onsite Photovoltaic (PV) generation. The proposed methodology is implemented for the UK as a case study. The configurations in this study are designed based on the technical considerations involved in retrofitting a typical fuel station as a fast charging facility for EVs. From the results, it is observed that the configurations with 4 EVSE, 1 BESS, and 8 h of operation and the configuration with 4 EVSE, 1 BESS, and 1 PV system for 8 h of operation are economically viable. The abovementioned configurations are the most economically feasible configurations in terms of the Net Present Value (NPV), Internal Rate of Return (IRR) and the Discounted Payback Period (DPP) amongst the other configurations considered in this study. The proposed methodology indicates that though the connection cost is the dominant factor affecting the feasibility, the use of BESS with or without PV can reduce the connection cost by almost 90% depending on the capacity of BESS. The methodology acts as a decision support tool to select a techno-economically feasible configuration of EVSE, BESS, and PV.
Graphical abstract
Cost of Energy Comparison, Including Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE)—2021 Update
Power-to-green urea is the concept of urea production using hydrogen from photovoltaic (PV)-electrolysis; a promising option for remote area that do not have natural gas reserves. In this study techno-economic analysis of a small-scaled power-to-green urea plant is conducted with the purpose of obtaining energy efficiency of the system, specific energy consumption, and urea price. Process simulation is carried out by using Aspen Plus and green urea price is calculated using cash flow with 4 schemes. Scheme 1 uses investment cost of technology in 2019, scheme 2 is modification of scheme 1 with additional revenue through clean development mechanisms (CDM), scheme 3 uses investment cost of technology in 2030 and 2050, and scheme 4 is a combination of scheme 2 and 3. The obtained result shows the system efficiency of 7.9% and specific energy consumption of 109 GJ/MT urea. The price of green urea with Scheme 1, 2, 3, and 4 in order are 2342, 2320, 2026 and 1704, as well as 2004 and 1682 USD/MT urea, respectively. Power-to-green urea could not compete economically with conventional large-scale urea; however, due to its stable price and easily acquired raw material it is still highly relevant for remote areas in the future.
Cost of Energy Comparison, Including Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE)—2020 Update
This paper proposes a methodology for assessing the concentrator solar cell reliability in a real application for a given location provided the results from accelerated life tests. We have applied this methodology for the evaluation of warranty times of commercial triple junction solar cells operating inside real concentrator modules in Golden (Colorado, USA), Madrid (Spain) and Tucson (Arizona, USA) for the period 2012–2015. Warranty times in Golden and Madrid, namely, 68 and 31 years, respectively, for the analysed period, indicate the robustness of commercial triple junction solar cells. Nevertheless, the warranty time of 15 years for Tucson suggests the need of improvement in the heat extraction of the solar cell within the concentrator module. Therefore, the influence of the location on the reliability of concentrator solar cells is huge, and it has no sense to supply general reliability values for a given concentrator product. The influence of these warranty times for the three locations on the levelised cost of electricity has been analysed. Cost of €c10–12/kWh can be achieved nowadays, while after 1 GWp cumulative installed power, a dramatic reduction to levels of €c2–3/kWh is achievable.
This work presents a pathway for the transition to a 100% renewable energy (RE) system by 2050 for Iran. An hourly resolved model is simulated to investigate the total power capacity required from 2015 to 2050 in 5-year time steps to fulfil the electricity demand for Iran. In addition, shares of various RE resources and storage technologies have been estimated for the applied years, and all periods before in 5-year time steps. The model takes the 2015 installed power plant capacities, corresponding lifetimes and total electrical energy demand to compute and optimize the mix of RE plants needed to be installed to achieve a 100% RE power system by 2050. The optimization is carried out on the basis of assumed costs and technological status of all energy technologies involved. Moreover, the role of storage technologies in the energy system, and integration of the power sector with desalination and non-energetic industrial gas sectors are examined. Our results reveal that RE technologies can fulfil all electricity demand by the year 2050 at a price level of about 32-44 €/MWhel depending on the sectorial integration. Moreover, the combination of solar PV and battery storage is found as a least cost solution after 2030 for Iran. 1. Introduction A transition to an energy system based on 100% renewable energy (RE) is not only possible but also is necessary to respond to rapidly increasing energy demand and address the current climate crisis. However, variability of renewable sources (in particular solar and wind) poses concerns regarding the reliability and cost of an energy system that derives a large fraction of its energy from these sources. This has led to the emergence of energy storage as a key technology in the management of larger shares of energy from renewable sources. Sustainable energy scenarios have been introduced and developed for various parts of the world to highlight possible future energy systems and broaden the perspectives of decision makers on what they should take into consideration [1], [2]. Examining renewable based energy scenarios in Iran is a challenging and interesting case study because of the following country characteristics:
A chronological multi-area generation planning model is used to investigate the influence of low-cost batteries on the cost-optimal share of wind power and photovoltaics (PV) under varying assumptions about their future investment costs. The analysis is performed in two different geographic locations that have a large difference in the solar resource. The results from around 400 scenario runs demonstrate to what extent lower investment costs mitigate the resource variability. In this regard, PV is more sensitive than wind power. Given the assumptions utilized, the model starts to invests in PV at much higher cost levels in Iberia (~1050 €/kW) than in Northern Europe (~400 €/kW). Furthermore, in Iberia batteries benefit PV strongly (already at 300 €/kWh) while in Northern Europe batteries are not as relevant, since PV has a strong seasonal variation that cannot be economically mitigated with batteries and the region already has high amounts of flexible reservoir hydro power.
This report investigates data supplied from installed operating PV plants in different countries in order to improve understanding of efficiency and reliability issues of current state-of-the-art PV systems.
The first section describes the continued efforts to enrich and maintain the existing online performance database and to add new operational data from existing and new grid-connected PV systems. This activity deals with quality data only, selected and analyzed for usability by experts from each of the contributing countries.
Currently (mid 2014), the PV online performance database contains operational data of nearly 600 PV systems in 13 countries. The spectrum ranges from small installations of less than 1 kWp to power plants of more than 2 MWp. The database includes datasets of PV systems with different cell technologies and type of mounting like flat roof, sloped roof, façade, ground mounted or PV sound barriers. An important function is the possibility to filter the available data within the database. This allows a comparison of the different plant data within the sorted arguments. It is possible to export the data to a spreadsheet application like Microsoft Excel. In this way, it is possible to create own graphs and to analyze the data in more detail.
A complementary approach is described in the second section, attempting to answer the question “How well is PV serving the world”. Therefore, only two parameters from as many PV systems as possible are analyzed:
Annual yield (kWh per installed kWp)
Performance ratio PR
Experts of Task 13 have attempted to collect appropriate data for a large amount of PV systems. Notably data from Italy, USA and Australia have been supplied for this. Limited data availability from other participating countries has been addressed by using so-called web scraping techniques that collect and organize performance data automatically in databases.
In order to study correlation between performance and system size, data have been divided into system power classes ranging from <1 kWp to >10 MWp. In addition, performance data can be related to climate zones.
It may be concluded that today’s PV systems are in general “delivering what the salesman says”, with country differences in annual yield that can well be explained by irradiation differences or climate zone differences.
While the first two sections deal with the analysis of PV system efficiency, the third section aims at finding the root cause of faults that lead to system downtime or low efficiency, as expressed by a low overall Performance Ratio.
A study has begun to find correlation between defined faults, either hardware failures or low efficiencies, and the system parameters immediately before the fault as compared to long before the fault. The systems under study were and will be monitored for efficiency. When the efficiency drops or a failure becomes apparent the system parameters will be examined and compared to periods of time past. It is assumed that a correlation between monitored system parameters and specific failures can be found and catalogued. If a statistical correlation can be found between the changing characteristics of specific parameters and specific fault types, these correlations could be used as signs for impending failure.
Such correlations could then be used to alert the owner on faults when no Performance Ratio monitoring exists.
This report focuses on the analytical assessment of photovoltaic (PV) plant performance on the overall PV system level. In particular, this report provides detailed guidelines and comprehensive descriptions of methods and models used when analyzing grid-connected PV system performance.
The main objectives of this report are:
to propose good practices for PV system monitoring today,
to determine and understand PV system losses that cannot be assessed by direct measurements in commercial PV systems,
to determine and understand the behavior of new PV technologies in long-term system operation,
to learn from previous bad experiences and draw out lessons for new installations in the IEA PVPS member countries.
In the starting section, “Photovoltaic System Monitoring”, best practices in PV monitoring are documented. In addition to describing general monitoring approaches and listing common reference documents, the section outlines peculiarities of different measurement equipment and highlights best practices for hardware configuration and installation. An overview of various interesting measurement quantities and related failure patterns is also provided.
In the second section, “Understanding Photovoltaic System Operation through Monitoring”, comprehensive guidelines on how to analyze performance data are given, based on concrete examples using periodic linear regression. The section highlights the versatility of this linear-regression-based approach for PV performance analysis. The approach can, for example, be used to assess the influence of module temperature on array and system performance, the influence of wind speed, DC voltage deviations and their relation to module temperature, as well as the resilience of grid voltage to active power.
The majority of presented methods and tools can be applied irrespective of particular module technologies. However, a number of special effects related to less common module technologies require some consideration, as outlined in a dedicated chapter on “new” technologies. In particular, CIGS and amorphous silicon modules have been analyzed in this study. Based on data from different experimental installations in the field, the specific behavior of the new modules was modeled and compared to classical crystalline silicon PV. The existing models for crystalline silicon require major modifications especially for modules involving amorphous silicon. This is detailed in the third chapter, “Understanding Effects Related to Special Technologies”.
Finally, measures that can help improve the performance of PV systems are described in the fourth chapter, “PV System Performance Improvement”. This section outlines recommendations for improvement, based on lessons learned from PV system design over the past decade. To this end, a brief introduction to traditional performance indicators is given, along with an overview of the trends in PV system performance over the years. Key system design decisions, such as mounting angle and row distance, inverter to module power ratio, and cabling optimizations, are also addressed. Several examples on both shading losses and inverter to module power ratio are highlighted, providing deeper insight into the pitfalls and merits of various system design options. Finally, the basic approach of real-time data processing is described as a means to optimize system output by increased responsiveness to outages.
The full report delivers a comprehensive set of practical guidelines for analytical PV system monitoring. Applied systematically, these guidelines will contribute to further increasing the performance of PV power plants.
Likelihood of a 100% Renewable World Global Network or Local Autonomy? Timeline for a 100% Renewable World
Maintaining Returns: PV O&M Opportunities & Prices
BNEF, 2013. Maintaining Returns: PV O&M Opportunities & Prices. Bloomberg New Energy Finance report.
Personal communication with Pietro Radoia
BNEF, 2015. Personal communication with Pietro Radoia, 14 April 2015.
- Ise Fraunhofer
Fraunhofer ISE, 2014. Photovoltaics Report (2014), updated 24 October 2014.
SEMI International Technology Roadmap for Photovoltaic, Sixth Edition, 2014 Results. PV Parity, 2013. Grid Integration Cost of Photovoltaic Power Generation
ITRPV, 2015. SEMI International Technology Roadmap for Photovoltaic, Sixth Edition, 2014 Results.
PV Parity, 2013. Grid Integration Cost of Photovoltaic Power Generation, project report.
Global Market Outlook for Solar
SolarPower Europe, 2015. Global Market Outlook for Solar Power 2015-2019.
Statistical data on the German Solar power industry
- Bsw-Solar
BSW-Solar, 2014. Statistical data on the German Solar power industry.
Grid Integration Cost of Photovoltaic Power Generation
ITRPV, 2015. SEMI International Technology Roadmap for Photovoltaic, Sixth Edition, 2014 Results.
PV Parity, 2013. Grid Integration Cost of Photovoltaic Power Generation, project report.