East-West Orientation of PV Systems and Neighbourhood Energy Exchange to Maximize Local Photovoltaics Energy Consumption

Abstract

Increasing local photovoltaics (PV) utilization can reduce energy transportation losses and mitigate overvoltages and transformer overloadings. Strategies so far investigated and applied for this purpose are load shifting, the use of electricity storages, and the installation of east-west instead of south-oriented PV systems. In this article, we investigate and analyze the potential of a novel concept for the purpose of local PV consumption maximization based on neighbourhood energy exchange in combination with different cardinal directions of PV systems installed on buildings within a neighbourhood. Results demonstrate that this novel concept can lead to significantly increased local PV consumption rates in relation to today’s default configurations without considerable extra costs or control efforts.

Keywords

• Photovoltaics, neighbourhood energy exchange, energy management, renewable energy, residential sector, energy self-consumption maximization.

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