Evaluation of the sustainability of decentralised energy systems for domestic applications

The transition from centralised to decentralised energy systems is driven by prosumers. They invest in the decentralised energy systems of their households and are primarily interested in their own financial improvement. The trend in these domestic energy systems is to link the three energy sectors electricity, heating and transport. In view of the long investment cycles, prosumers are faced with the question of which investment is most sustainable. A sustainable investment should be robust against price fluctuations, especially in the energy and emission certificate markets as well as in the regulatory environment and should consider likely future scenarios. To answer this question, we model three different systems based on different fuels, the coupling of the electricity, heating and transport sectors and compare them in different scenarios by minimising their operating costs. Hereby we provide a decision support for prosumers to invest in order to make the transition to a decentralised energy system as sustainable as possible.