Green Energy Generation in Buildings: Grid-Tied Distributed Generation Systems (DGS) With Energy Storage Applications to Sustain the Smart Grid Transformation

Abstract

The challenge of electricity distribution’s upgrade to incorporate new technologies is big, and electric utilities are mandated to work diligently on this agenda, thus making investments to ensure that current networks maintain their electricity supply commitments secure and reliable in face of disruptions and adverse environmental conditions from a variety of sources. The paper presents a new model based on energy homeostasis for power control and energy management using tariffs differentiation as incentive, considered by ENEL, the largest electric utility in Chile. The model optimizes grid-tied distributed generation (DG) systems with energy storage, in line with the utility’s green energy program, part of its Smart Grid Transformation, aimed at installing grid-tied DG systems with solar generation and energy storage in Santiago, Chile. Results present different tariff options, system’s capacity and energy storage alternatives, in order to compare proposed strategies with the actual case, where no green energy is present. The results show the advantage of the proposed tariffs scheme and power-energy management model based on different scenarios, providing a good and safe option for installing DG solutions to the grid.

Keywords

• electric tariffs
• energy homeostasis
• distributed generation
• electric utility
• green energy
• power and energy management