Economic Assessment of Solar Home Batteries: Project Analysis

This project provides an economic assessment of solar home batteries, examining their benefits and costs. It explores the primary and secondary objectives, including improving power system security and enhancing safety for line workers and consumers. The project details the advantages of solar home batteries, such as increased energy independence and backup power capabilities. It considers various costs, including project establishment and operation and maintenance. The economic benefits, categorized into market and safety aspects, are also analyzed. The project reviews different battery types, like lithium-ion and lead-acid, and evaluates the economics of adopting battery storage, including payback periods. A literature review is included, discussing the combination of home batteries with PV systems and their impact on electricity bills. The project also summarizes quantified market benefits and outlines load profiles for battery owners, emphasizing self-consumption strategies. References from relevant sources are also provided to support the analysis.

SOLAR HOME BATTERY –ECONOMIC
ASSESMENT

 Project Objectives
 The aims of this project are to:
• Primary objectives
1. To improve the power system and network security in Australia
2. Protect the safety of line workers, installers and consumers.
• Secondary objectives
• To understand the risks that are associated with the use of solar home batteries
• Detail on how an energy storage database could provide significant safety benefits for
emergency services

 Benefits of solar home batteries
 Solar home batteries increase one’s energy independence
 The solar home batteries have ability to store more solar energy
 In most cases the home solar batteries serve as a backup power in case of outages
 Solar home batteries create a sustainable energy future.
 Solar home batteries help in reducing the pressure on the electricity networks (Samad et al,
2013).

 Costs considered
 Some of the costs that are considered in the installation of a solar home battery system are;
Project establishment costs
Operation and maintenance costs
Competition cots
Ancillary database adjustment costs(Whittingham, 2012).
Operation and maintenance costs

 Economic benefits considered
 There are many economic benefits that are associated with the solar home batteries and they
have been categorized as follow.
 Market benefits
Medium to long term planning
System reliability
Contingency planning and power system security
Central dispatch process
 Safety benefits
Safety benefits to industry workers
Safety benefits to emergence services workers
Enhance fire risk management

Types of solar home batteries
 The commonly used batteries for PV solar storage in
most homes are:
 Lithium-ion batteries
 Lead-acid batteries
Lithium-ion batteries Lead-acid batteries

 Economics of adopting a battery storage
 To evaluate if acquiring a battery storage system is an investment option for most homes the
following has been analyzed.
The simple payback period i.e. The length of time which is required for an investment to
recover the installation costs.
The net present value of the investment
The discounted payback period which is usually the length of time required for an investment
to recover its initial cost by taking into account the time value of money.

 Literature review

 Literature review cont..
 Combining a home battery with a PV system economic assessment.
Combining a home battery storage to the PV unit can significantly add versality and reliability
to the solar system
 It can greatly assist lowering the electricity bill in three ways as discussed below.
In the cases where one is where one is on a time-of-use tariff you he/she can take benefit of the
lower off-peak electricity tariffs by charging up the battery during those off-peak houses in
order to use the battery when the tariffs are high.

 Summary of quantified market benefits
Deferred wholesale and network infrastructure benefit summary (present value)

Load profiles for battery owners
 The battery owners have a specific way of operating their system such as:
• Majority of residential households adding energy storage to their homes also have solar PV
systems.
• How users choose to charge and discharge their batteries will depend on the benefits they
ascribe to their systems.
• The charge/discharge profiles are likely to reflect an objective to maximise self-consumption.
• Charging and discharging profiles are therefore fixed systems.

 References
Pavlov, D., 2011. Lead-acid batteries: science and technology. Elsevier.
Samad, h.A., Khandker, S.R., Asaduzzaman, M. And yunus, M., 2013. The benefits of solar home
systems: an analysis from bangladesh. The world bank.
Whittingham, m.S., 2012. History, evolution, and future status of energy storage. Proceedings of
the IEEE, 100(special centennial issue), pp.1518-1534.