Photovoltaic and Energy Storage Sizing Algorithm for the Chilean Distribution Tariff

Abstract

Distribution customers are exposed to various tariff mechanisms from which they must select one that minimizes the electricity bill. Also, distributed generation (mainly Solar Photovoltaic) and distributed storage (mainly electro-chemical batteries) have arisen as an alternative to reduce electric bills. In general, the problem of selecting a specific photovoltaic and energy storage system size is NP-hard, as the trade-off between tariff mechanisms and photovoltaic and energy storage energy relationships is difficult; also, distribution customers may not have specific knowledge of the underlying optimization problem nor how to formulate an analysis in particular. This work considers the particular case of the Chilean distribution tariff mechanism to propose an easy-to-implement algorithm to obtain an near-optimal solution to the photovoltaic and energy storage sizing system, maximizing the economic return. A numerical example is presented to illustrate the usefulness of the proposed algorithm.