Development of electricity simulation model of urban houses and evaluating surplus electricity of photovoltaics (PV) considering housing stock transformation

Abstract

The Japanese government is advocating for the introduction of decentralized renewable energy devices such as photovoltaics (PV) and high thermal performance houses in urban areas. Due to variations in housing stock among different urban areas, the implementation of these houses and devices would have diverse effects on the supply and demand sides, potentially leading to diverse overproduction of PV electricity, referred to as surplus electricity. Existing research focuses on increasing the utilization of surplus electricity and quantifying the surplus electricity from individual buildings at a regional scale. Considering the lack of research that quantifies surplus electricity through shared PVs under the urban-scale contextual changes (widespread introduction of high-performance houses). Therefore, this study aims to address this gap by utilizing an archetype house simulation model to simulate and compare two scenarios (with or without houses retrofitting) regarding electricity demand for each street-level area, maximum power and duration time of surplus electricity in areas where surplus electricity would occur in the target city Fukuoka in 2025. The results indicate that, under the current residential PV stock and existing introduction rates, the peak surplus power occurs around noon in May, approximately 396 out of 1051 areas in Fukuoka would generate surplus electricity during 2025. Houses retrofitting would increase the surplus electricity (include maximum power and duration time) in these areas. Additionally, this study identifies the residential characteristics of areas that generate surplus electricity, including construction year, household composition, and the proportion of detached houses, whether with retrofitting or not. The results suggest attention to surplus electricity increasing in areas with a high proportion of detached houses when considering houses retrofitting.