Gopal Lal Somani is a former director of Rajasthan Renewable Energy Corporation (RRECL) in Jaipur. He said that distributed solar systems with storage capabilities are what enables India to provide clean energy to everyone at an affordable cost. The key to mission. In this article, he detailed the benefits and technical commercial feasibility of these systems to the country.
IISc A solar microgrid system installed at a primary health care center in Dharwad in Bangalore
Solar plus energy storage systems can bring multiple benefits to rooftop, micro/micro grid and independent off-grid market segments. Consumers can save on utility bills. The solar system with battery storage adds to the family value. A 3-10kW solar system with a 5kWh battery capacity may cost 150,000-500,000 Indian rupees or more and reduce consumers’ electricity bills by at least 50%.
Consumers can run their appliances when they want, not when the power company tells them. With solar systems and household batteries, consumers are in control. The excess energy is stored in household batteries, and they can use it when they need it most.
Net energy metering allows customers who use solar panels to generate their own electricity to sell the excess electricity generated back to the grid or store it in household batteries.
However, in India, not all states have uniform net energy metering policies, and these policies vary from state to state. State regulatory agencies can explain and play an important role in the uniform adoption of the state’s net energy metering policies, because central and state incentives can be used to use household batteries to use solar energy.
People all over the world are now using solar + battery storage systems to solve power outages caused by grid failures, power outages, storms, and other natural disasters that may cause loss of life and property.
Events such as floods, wildfires, hurricanes, sea level rise, and environmental damage-related starvation have caused damage all over the world. The costs associated with climate change are increasing, including rising healthcare costs, property damage, rising food prices, and so on.
The large-scale adoption of solar energy with storage functions is the ultimate solution to the adverse social and economic effects of dirty fossil fuels.
Solar energy means clean and healthy air. Storage makes it 24×7. Solar + stored energysupports a clean and green earth by eliminating the harmful and toxic emissions of fossil fuels.
Solar energy + energy storage will become an important contributor to the economy.
Large-scale deployment of solar energy and storage of distributed services, that is, the power on roofs, independent micro-grid systems, and 33/11 kV substations in rural areas will benefit community employment. Everyone benefits because these solar jobs cannot be outsourced.
Coal and natural gas are not free, they are expensive and dirty. Their prices are also unstable and have risen systematically in the past decade.
The cost of solar energy in India has dropped to 2 Indian rupees/kWh, and the same is true for the cost trend of utility-scale lithium-ion batteries. Increasing the subsidy price, even if the financing cost of off-grid independent systems, micro-grid systems and distributed solar power generation with storage is higher, it can also provide 24×7 clean energy for everyone.
The photovoltaic and energy storage power station located at the same location will be technically suitable for the existing transmission network, provide grid stability, increase the tail-end feeder voltage and eliminate unexpected power outages. In addition to this, all issues related to permit procedures, biology, water, noise, or any other possible environmental impacts will disappear during execution.
This concept can be quickly popularized throughout the country and achieve a high level of grid penetration. Technically, 200 GW of solar energy will be accommodated in the grid. DSG with this level of storage penetration will change India's future energy resilience to achieve its 2030 power roadmap and significantly replace all other power generation methods.
At the same time, obtaining multilateral funds for distributed solar power generation with storage and smart grid functions will rationalize the cost of grid coordination.
Microgrid solar system, off-grid independent solar power generation microgrid system, net metering rooftop solar system and small capacity (500 kW-2MW) grid-connected distributed solar power generation system, 25% of the storage will be connected to the existing 33/11 kV The substation is the key to India's mission of providing clean energy to everyone at an affordable cost, which is Indian rupees 3-3.5/kWh.
Solarization of all rural 33/11 kV substations by installing a distributed solar power system with battery storage will ensure the rural population’s daytime power supply, provide energy security, eliminate transmission losses, and create a large number of employment opportunities.
The good news is that residential solar systems can power electric vehicles. Consumers can use clean energy from solar energy to fuel their cars and run their home appliances.
The potential of combining energy storage systems with photovoltaic panels used in electric vehicles represents a step towards sustainable mobility, and the cogeneration system also validates this.
Combining energy storage systems with solar photovoltaic systems, for every 1 kilowatt of photovoltaic power installed, using 0.5-1 kilowatt-hour energy storage systems can increase the self-consumption of self-generated photovoltaic energy by 15-25%, thereby reducing electricity costs. With the rapid decline in cost, batteries can increase their self-consumption to 20-50% in the near future.
The economics of distributed solar power generation and ESS in residential buildings have been advocated by experts in various publications, which usually use the levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) as the main indicator.
The input parameters of the battery have great uncertainty. LCOE will vary with the application and technology (lead acid, lithium ion, sodium sulfur, vanadium redox flow battery). Energy storage can be used for public utility energy time shifting, power transmission and distribution investment delay, community-scale energy management, increase self-consumption, grid-connected frequency modulation, support voltage regulation, etc. Considering all these applications, the technology is now in a dominant position.
The value of distributed solar photovoltaic is increased through the use of ESS and load control. Their combination is also called "Solar Plus". Case studies show that the combination of 8 kW photovoltaic installations with 7.8 kWh batteries provides a profitable model for residential and commercial applications under net metering regulations. The integrated system is profitable. The cost of the photovoltaic power plant is between 40,000 Indian rupees/kW and 45,000 Indian rupees/kWh, and the battery cost is between 20,000 Indian rupees/kWh and 50,000 Indian rupees/kWh.
As solar energy penetrates the Indian power grid, grid-scale batteries will play a vital role over time. It is necessary to try to predict the future capital cost of BESS and encourage this solar + storage penetration on a large scale.
According to a commission from the Indian government, a research report from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory estimated the cost of grid-scale lithium-ion battery storage. The report predicts that by 2025 and 2030, the capital cost of 1MW/4-MWh photovoltaic power plants in India will be reduced to $122/kWh, which is 46% and 59% lower than the current estimated capital cost.
Tariff policies and Indian electricity regulations need to be completely changed to encourage large-scale solar penetration and deployment of ESS systems in India, and to change the energy sector. Germany and Australia are examples worthy of emulation.
Input from Gopal Lal Somani
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More articles by Uma Gupta
I have an independent photovoltaic system in the Himalayas for more than 8 years... The original Exide sealed battery has been replaced by a new battery. I have a photovoltaic system with 6 250W photovoltaic panels, a charger, 4Nos 12V 150Ahr Exide sealing gel (maintenance-free) batteries and a 3KW UPS (a larger UPS is required to start the 3/4 HP water pump). The battery is almost not enough to meet the night load...mainly LED/LCD light computer, A/V system and small (2X40W) hot air blower. Therefore, I have a 1500W photovoltaic system, 6KWhr battery (4 X 12V X 120Ahr)... or 1.5KW/6KWHr system.
This article introduces an analysis of an 8KW/7.8KWhr system using net metering that reflects distributed storage + generation. According to my personal experience in the past 8 years, when there is no grid connection, the KW/KWhr ratio (PV rating/battery storage) should be about... 1:4 or higher. Therefore, a "case study" with a KW/KWhr ratio <1.0 is not suitable for a stand-alone system. I believe that increasing the battery capacity to 32KWhr (KW/KWhr= 4) will significantly change the return on investment of the system, and is misleading for an independent system that is part of distributed generation + storage.
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