Increased photovoltaic utilisation from direct current distribution: Quantification of geographical location impact
Journal article, 2021

In this paper, the performance of a direct current (DC) distribution system is modelled for a single-family residential building and compared with a conventional alternating current (AC) system to quantify the potential energy savings and gains in photovoltaic (PV) utilisation. The modelling is made for two different climates to quantify the impact of the geographical location. Results show that the system losses are reduced by 19–46% and the PV utilisation increased by 3.9–7.4% when using a DC distribution system compared to an AC equivalent, resulting in system efficiency gains in the range of 1.3–8.8%. Furthermore, it is shown that the geographical location has some effect on the system's performance and PV utilisation, but most importantly, the grid interaction is paramount for the performance of the DC topology.

direct current (DC)

photovoltaic

energy savings

residential building

PV load correlation

battery storage

Author

Patrik Ollas

RISE Research Institutes of Sweden

Chalmers, Electrical Engineering, Electric Power Engineering

Torbjörn Thiringer

Chalmers, Electrical Engineering, Electric Power Engineering

Huijuan Chen

RISE Research Institutes of Sweden

Caroline Markusson

RISE Research Institutes of Sweden

Progress in Photovoltaics: Research and Applications

1062-7995 (ISSN) 1099159x (eISSN)

Vol. 29 7 846-856

Subject Categories

Energy Systems

Computer Systems

Other Electrical Engineering, Electronic Engineering, Information Engineering

DOI

10.1002/pip.3407

More information

Latest update

4/5/2022 5