Grid stability evaluation and techno-economic analysis of shared solar applications within a Swedish energy community.

Sammanfattning: The joint European electricity production in 2022 was 2.9 PWh where 34.3% of the electricity came from sources of natural gas and coal. However, to be able to achieve the goals of the Paris agreement, greenhouse gas emissions must peak before 2025 and thus call for a rapid decarbonatization. For this, using less energy originating from fossil sources and increasing the use of renewable energy is crucial. One way to decentralize and implement renewable energy is using energy communities. This is also a way for actors to participate in energy trading and to enable collective ownership of local production and storage technology. However, since the electricity grid in Sweden is largely outdated, this poses as a problem for continued electrification. To evaluate if decentralisation of the electricity distribution and production can minimise the load on the national grid, The research institute of Sweden (RISE) has initiated pilot studies to assess the possibility and impact of introducing energy communities in Sweden with the help of KTH for simulations. As part of such a pilot study this thesis focuses on a district in Örebro named Tamarinden, where it is planned to implement a local DC-network to allow sharing of locally PV produced electricity. Through using the Python package Panda Power as well as quantitative analyses in Excel, the thesis aim was to propose a configuration of the standard local distribution grid and analyse the impact from PVs, battery storage as well as the DC-network focusing on grid stability and solar penetration. In addition, an economic feasibility analysis was made. The results showed that an energy community greatly impact the solar penetration and that grid stability improvements could not be determined. This could be due to the choice of production technology, solar PV, as these have peak production during low demand season. Furthermore, a proposition for the local grid configuration was constructed. Nevertheless, the economic feasibility showed that even though the impact on PV penetration is great, the cost of the technology is too high in comparison to savings made in terms of lowered electricity demand. In conclusion, the implementation of such an energy community in Sweden is currently unbeneficial from an economic point of view.