Abstract
In the current context of mandatory growth of renewable energy sources for electrical supply, in order to reduce CO2 emissions in the process of electricity generation, it is worth interest to evaluate the feasibility of the deployment of new large solar photovoltaic production facilities. This study seeks to analyze the costs and benefits of this type of infrastructures, considering the region of León (Spain) as case study due to its high potential. The Levelized Cost of Energy is used in this study as main decision tool, so a sensibility study on this indicator has been carried out, including the financial interest rates, the capital and operation expenditures, the facilities performance and the expected life span of the installations. Three main locations have been selected in the region, close to the main power demand sites, in order to minimize power distribution losses between the power plants and end-users. Results show that an LCOE in the range between 0.21 and 0.26 €/kWh can be achieved. The simplified calculation presented allows a preliminary and quick assessment of the grid parity of a photovoltaic plant in locations where they are not known in detail.
Highlights
In recent years, concern about climate change has been growing, as global temperatures continue to rise and sea level gradually increases, as a result of the emission of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere
The LCOE defines the price at which each unit of energy produced must be sold, to offset the O&M costs and recover the investment, throughout the useful life of the plant, discounted at a rate that defines the profitability of the project, provides a comparison of the performance of different technologies for energy production, regardless of their technical characteristics or the regulations in force, which may be diverse and varied, and is essentially defined as the ratio between the total cost of the installation over its lifetime and the total energy produced updated during this time [7], as Darling et al stated in 2008, and as it can be seen in Eq (1)
This work assesses the economic feasibility of deploying large solar PV power plants at three sites in the region of Leon (Spain), considering a context of growth in the generation of electricity from renewable and CO2 free energy sources, which arises as a response to the high requirements set by the European Union, in this regard aligned with the trend observed in all European countries, including Spain
Summary
Concern about climate change has been growing, as global temperatures continue to rise and sea level gradually increases, as a result of the emission of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. This climate change is already considered irreversible, but strategic plans are being developed to mitigate its effects, as declared Shishlov et al, in 2016 [1]. To achieve these objectives, the aim is to promote the use of cleaner energy sources, free of CO2 and other greenhouse gases in their emissions. On the other hand, analyzing the data set collected on the maximum renewable generation produced in Spain, it can be seen that it follows a growing trend (see Fig. 1(b)), up to 539.9 GWh generated in 2018
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