Photovoltaic (PV)-battery systems: how does the behaviour of users in a typical Austrian household influence the performance of a PV fed home-battery system?

Abstract

At the moment, a variety of battery technologies and systems are available in the market. And even more technologies and systems are in research. Moreover, there are wide areas of application for the use of batteries, which again impose very different (technological) requirements on each battery technology or system. Therefore, a concise statement of a single best technology for the future market cannot be easily given. According to the study of the 'Energietechnischen Gesellschaft im VDE' batteries will additionally lift the interest in photovoltaics (PV) in the residential field (Aundrup, et al., 2015). As a matter of fact, declining module and balance of system (BOS) costs of PV, decreasing PV 'Feed-in Tariffs' (FiT) as well as rising electricity prices for the end costumer enable for PV Battery Energy Storage Systems (PV-BESS) favorable market conditions. Homeowners, who produce, store and use their local generated energy, will not just become prosumers, but also derive an additional benefit of being more independent from any future energy price fluctuations, shifts of the market or general market failures. As area of application residential households in Austria have been chosen. In a first step this master thesis briefly analyses the available technologies and basic functionality of residential PV systems. More time will be spent to review and analyze the past and future market of available battery technologies and systems in a technological and economical perspective with respect to the already stated form of application. The most appropriate PV and battery technology out of this analysis will be chosen and used in the household as underlying PV-BESS. It follows from the text above, that in a case of individual households the behaviour of the persons living in that household might have a significant influence on the overall performance and durability of the battery system. But which behaviours cause what effects and to which extent? In this master thesis, the dataset of the 'Multifunktionales Batteriespeichersystem' (MBS) from R. Sterrer and W. Prüggler has been used. In a project consortium1, they compiled load profiles for four different Austrian households. Each household and person of the four homes has been outfitted with its own pattern of behaviour. Together with the chosen PV-BESS this paper will identify similarities, contrasts and other tendencies of behaviours, which might be significant in influencing performance and durability of the whole system. Additionally, a favorable outcome of this master thesis would be a classification of PV-BESS type and size for each of the observed households. All the calculation will be done in Excel and further use of sensitivity analyses will show the dependencies of each PV-BESS. It will be necessary to define general assumptions, but those will be elaborated in more detail later in the thesis. By having different sources with uncertainty in its inputs, the uncertainty of the output of the PVBESS in the specified application can be better understood. As a consequence, this master thesis will try to answer the following research question: Photovoltaic (PV)-Battery Systems: How does the behaviour of users in a typical Austrian household influence the performance of a PV fed home-battery system?