Abstract
This study is concerned with the national transposition of the European Renewable Energy Directive into Austrian law. The objective is to estimate the economic viability for residential customers when participating in a renewable energy community (REC), focused on PV electricity sharing. The developed simulation model considers the omission of certain electricity levies as well as the obligatory proximity constraint being linked to grid levels, thus introducing a stepwise reduction of per-unit grid charges as an incentive to keep the inner-community electricity transfer as local as possible. Results show that cost savings in residential RECs cover a broad range from 9 EUR/yr to 172 EUR/yr. The lowest savings are gained by customers without in-house PV systems, while owners of a private PV system make the most profits due to the possibility of selling as well as buying electricity within the borders of the REC. Generally, cost savings increase when the source is closer to the sink, as well as when more renewable electricity is available for inner-community electricity transfer. The presence of a commercial customer impacts savings for households insignificantly, but increases local self-consumption approximately by 10%. Despite the margin for residential participants to break even being narrow, energy community operators will have to raise a certain participation fee. Such participation fee would need to be as low as 2.5 EUR/month for customers without in-house PV systems in a purely residential REC, while other customers could still achieve a break-even when paying 5 EUR/month to 6.7 EUR/month in addition. Those results should alert policy makers to find additional support mechanisms to enhance customers’ motivations to participate if RECs are meant as a concept that should be adopted on a large scale.
Highlights
In order to achieve the ambitious European climate goals until 2030—a 40% cut in greenhouse gas emissions from the levels of 1990, a minimum of 32% share for renewable energy, and at least32.5% improvement in energy efficiency—significant efforts are required [1]
As national transpositions to enable renewable energy community (REC) will not be consistent across European countries, this study aims at introducing the specifics of the transposition into Austrian law, which is expected to come into force in 2021
This study aims to close this gap by evaluating the economic viability of REC participation for primarily residential customers under the framework of the Renewable Energy Directive (RED) transposed into Austrian law
Summary
In order to achieve the ambitious European climate goals until 2030—a 40% cut in greenhouse gas emissions from the levels of 1990, a minimum of 32% share for renewable energy, and at least32.5% improvement in energy efficiency—significant efforts are required [1]. In order to achieve the ambitious European climate goals until 2030—a 40% cut in greenhouse gas emissions from the levels of 1990, a minimum of 32% share for renewable energy, and at least. Union presented a thorough update of its energy policy framework to enable a sustainable energy transition. This novel rulebook is known as the Clean Energy for All Europeans Package, which is comprised of eight legislative acts that are meant to bring benefits from both environmental and economic perspectives [2]. Initiatives to achieve a sustainable energy future are Energies 2020, 13, 5743; doi:10.3390/en13215743 www.mdpi.com/journal/energies. Energies 2020, 13, 5743 currently even further intensified at European level due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
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