Distributed Energy Resources (DER) Right Now

Decentralized Renewable Energy Systems: A Status-Quo Analysis

February 22, 2019 (Advanced Science News)

“The increasing share of decentralized intermittent renewable energy generation reinforces the necessity of balancing local production and energy consumption. Decentralized renewable energy systems are promising options to cope with this challenge. They are systems of interconnected buildings, which i) are powered by renewable energy sources (e.g., solar, wind), ii) combine multiple energy carriers (e.g., electricity, heat, hydrogen), and iii) integrate both storage (e.g., batteries, thermal tanks) and conversion (e.g., heat pump, electrolyzer) technologies. At the system level, they can range from single buildings, such as multi-family homes, to groups of buildings within neighborhoods, communities or city quarters.

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Despite high up-front investment costs, these systems can provide numerous benefits: by increasing self-consumption of renewable electricity produced on-site, they can substantially reduce overall energy costs. They demonstrate large synergy potential and high operational flexibility, thereby improving input resource utilization, alleviating stress from the local grid, reducing transmission and distribution losses, and creating a more reliable energy supply…The trend toward decentralized energy systems is likely to be enforced in the future due to widespread reductions in technology costs, further technological learning, and the coupling of [the energy, mobility and industry sectors]…” click here for more

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