Evaluating the impact of geographic distribution of photovoltaic self-consumption on energy losses

Abstract

Photovoltaic (PV) self-consumption concept has emerged as a sustainable and economically viable alternative to save electricity provided by electric utilities. There are several concerns about the massive deployment of PV self-consumption installations. One of them is the influence of such installations on energy losses. Several research works have indicated that PV self-consumption installations reduce or increase energy losses depending on their penetration level. These research works use a uniform geographic distribution of PV self-consumption installations. However, rural areas are more likely to have a higher PV self-consumption penetration rate than urban areas and so, a uniform distribution may not be a proper approach. This paper proposes a methodology with different levels of geographic distribution to evaluate this issue. This methodology has been applied to the electric network of Murcia (Spain). Simulation results show that there is a significant influence of geographic concentration or dispersion of PV self-consumption systems on energy losses.