Equitable Participation of PV Prosumers in LV Distribution Networks

This paper presents a methodology to establish the adequate capacity of Renewable Energy Resources that all current low-voltage (LV) users would be able to install at their houses based on the transformer rated power capacity and the amount of LV users. This strategy will simplify the technical constraints that policy makers should establish and will facilitate the technical restrictions that Distribution System Operators (DSOs) should observe when determining how much energy prosumers can generate on the LV network without affecting the technical operation of the system. The study case is based on an existing LV network located in Bogota, Colombia with historical data of residential electric energy consumption modeled with OpenDSS. Environmental variables as irradiance and temperature are statistically treated with Easyfit, allowing to generate random data for supplying the OpenDSS model. Having the network model in OpenDSS and the stochastic data, a Python program is used to run multiple power flow simulations. The photovoltaic (PV) rated capacity of prosumers is adjusted to different percentages to evaluate the effects on the distribution system operation. This assessment allows to determine the maximum capacity that LV grid can host considering it is equally distributed among all the users.