Solar Energy Technologies Office

NREL's bottom-up cost models can be used to assess the minimum sustainable price (MSP) and modeled market price (MMP) of PV and storage systems having various configurations. MSP can be used to estimate future potential cost-reduction opportunities for PV and PV-plus-storage systems, thus helping guide research and development aimed at advancing cost-effective system configurations. MMP can be used to understand the cost of systems under recent market conditions. The MSP data in this annual benchmarking report will be used to inform the formulation of, and track progress toward, the Solar Energy Technologies Office's Government Performance and Reporting Act cost targets.

Abstract To quantify the potential value of technological advances to the photovoltaics (PV) sector, this paper examines the impact of changes to key PV module and system parameters on the levelized cost of energy (LCOE). The parameters selected include module manufacturing cost, efficiency, degradation rate, and service lifetime. NREL's System Advisor Model (SAM) is used to calculate the lifecycle cost per kilowatt‐hour (kWh) for residential, commercial, and utility scale PV systems within the contiguous United States, with a focus on utility scale. Different technological pathways are illustrated that may achieve the Department of Energy's SunShot goal of PV electricity that is at grid price parity with conventional electricity sources. In addition, the impacts on the 2015 baseline LCOE due to changes to each parameter are shown. These results may be used to identify research directions with the greatest potential to impact the cost of PV electricity. Copyright © 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

ADVERTISEMENT RETURN TO ISSUEPREVEnergy FocusNEXTADDITION / CORRECTIONThis article has been corrected. View the notice.The Path to Perovskite Commercialization: A Perspective from the United States Solar Energy Technologies OfficeTimothy D. Siegler*Timothy D. SieglerOak Ridge Institute of Science and Engineering, Oak Ridge, Tennessee 37830, United States*[email protected]More by Timothy D. Sieglerhttps://orcid.org/0000-0001-6033-2232, Andrew DawsonAndrew DawsonSolar Energy Technologies Office, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, U.S. Department of Energy, Washington, D.C. 20585, United StatesMore by Andrew Dawson, Peter LobaccaroPeter LobaccaroAllegheny Science and Technology, under contract to the U.S. Department of Energy, Bridgeport, West Virginia 26330, United StatesMore by Peter Lobaccarohttps://orcid.org/0000-0003-4675-1400, David UngDavid UngOak Ridge Institute of Science and Engineering, Oak Ridge, Tennessee 37830, United StatesMore by David Ung, Markus E. BeckMarkus E. BeckSolar Energy Technologies Office, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, U.S. Department of Energy, Washington, D.C. 20585, United StatesMore by Markus E. Beck, Garrett NilsenGarrett NilsenSolar Energy Technologies Office, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, U.S. Department of Energy, Washington, D.C. 20585, United StatesMore by Garrett Nilsen, and Leonard L. Tinker*Leonard L. TinkerSolar Energy Technologies Office, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy, U.S. Department of Energy, Washington, D.C. 20585, United States*[email protected]More by Leonard L. TinkerCite this: ACS Energy Lett. 2022, 7, 5, 1728–1734Publication Date (Web):April 20, 2022Publication History Received24 March 2022Accepted6 April 2022Published online20 April 2022Published inissue 13 May 2022https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acsenergylett.2c00698https://doi.org/10.1021/acsenergylett.2c00698newsACS PublicationsCopyright © Published 2022 by American Chemical Society. This publication is available under these Terms of Use. Request reuse permissions This publication is free to access through this site. Learn MoreArticle Views14130Altmetric-Citations16LEARN ABOUT THESE METRICSArticle Views are the COUNTER-compliant sum of full text article downloads since November 2008 (both PDF and HTML) across all institutions and individuals. These metrics are regularly updated to reflect usage leading up to the last few days.Citations are the number of other articles citing this article, calculated by Crossref and updated daily. Find more information about Crossref citation counts.The Altmetric Attention Score is a quantitative measure of the attention that a research article has received online. Clicking on the donut icon will load a page at altmetric.com with additional details about the score and the social media presence for the given article. Find more information on the Altmetric Attention Score and how the score is calculated. Share Add toView InAdd Full Text with ReferenceAdd Description ExportRISCitationCitation and abstractCitation and referencesMore Options Share onFacebookTwitterWechatLinked InRedditEmail PDF (1 MB) Get e-AlertscloseSUBJECTS:Degradation,Durability,Industrial manufacturing,Perovskites,Photovoltaics Get e-Alerts

Managing the stability of today’s electric power systems is based on decades of experience with the physical properties and control responses of large synchronous generators. Today’s electric power systems are rapidly transitioning toward having an increasing proportion of generation from nontraditional sources, such as wind and solar (among others), as well as energy storage devices, such as batteries. In addition to the variable nature of many renewable generation sources (because of the weather-driven nature of their fuel supply), these newer sources vary in size—from residential-scale rooftop systems to utility-scale power plants—and they are interconnected throughout the electric grid, both from within the distribution system and directly to the high-voltage transmission system. Most important for our purposes, many of these new resources are connected to the power system through power electronic inverters. Collectively, we refer to these sources as inverter-based resources.

NOW IS THE TIME TO PLAN FOR THE integration of signifi cant quantities of solar energy into the electricity grid. Although solar energy constitutes a very small portion of our energy system today, the size of the resource is enormous: The earth receives more energy from the sun in one hour than the global population uses in an entire year. In addition, the solar photovoltaic (PV) industry is growing very rapidly, sustaining an annual growth rate of more than 40% for the last decade. The combination of this rapid growth, falling costs, and a vast technical potential could make solar energy a serious contender for meeting our future energy needs.

Global Annual PV CapacityAdditions by Country From 2014 to 2023, global PV capacity additions grew from 40 GW dc to between 407 GW dc and 446 GW dc .-The spread in estimated global installations is due to uncertainty in Chinese reporting.-In 2023, global PV installs increased 73%-91% y/y. The total cumulative installed capacity for PV at the end of 2023 reached 1.6 TW dc .As of 2022, cumulative global PV capacity was about 1,200 GW dc .Analysts project that cumulative global PV installations will reach 2 TW dc -5 TW dc by 2030 and 4 TW dc -15 TW dc by 2050.Their results differ largely due to discrepancies in the projections of China's future capacity.IEA's Stated Policies Scenario (STEPS) uses assumptions based on the latest policy settings, including energy, climate, and industrial policies. IEA STEPS projects over 12.5 GW dc of PV capacity by 2050, with the United States, Europe, China, and India each having over 1 TW dc of cumulative capacity and China having over 6 TW dc of cumulative capacity.NREL | 9 NREL | 9 Chinese Generation Capacity Additions by SourceNote: Annual and cumulative solar values assume that China's National Energy Administration (NEA) reports distributed PV in direct-current terms and utilityscale PV in alternating-current terms.NEA reported 120 GW of utility-scale PV and 96 GW of distributed PV for 2023.On this slide, ac/dc conversions assume a dc-toac ratio of 1.1 for distributed PV.We use IEA-reported total capacity for W dc .

Each quarter, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) conducts the Quarterly Solar Industry Update, a presentation of technical trends within the solar industry, to the solar office staff. Each presentation focuses on global and U.S. supply and demand, module and system price, investment trends and business models, and updates on U.S. government programs supporting the solar industry.

The Second Law of Thermodynamics is used to analyze solar powered absorption cooling cycles and systems. Irreversibility is used as a figure of merit for components and cycles. The irreversibility of individual components is determined for several solar-powered absorption cycles and systems. The understanding of the causes of these irreversibilities identifies the areas of possible cycle and system improvements.

Each quarter, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) conducts the Quarterly Solar Industry Update, a presentation of technical trends within the solar industry. Each presentation focuses on global and U.S. supply and demand, module and system price, investment trends and business models, and updates on U.S. government programs supporting the solar industry.

Reliable and resilient grid operations with high penetration levels of distributed energy resources (DERs) can be achieved with improved situational awareness and seamless integration of DERs with utility enterprise controls. This paper presents the details of the development of a data-enhanced hierarchical control (DEHC) architecture and the results of its evaluation. The DEHC is a hybrid control framework that enables the efficient, reliable, and secure operation of distribution grids with extremely high penetrations of solar photovoltaic (PV) generation by seamlessly integrating centralized utility controls, distributed controls for DERs, and autonomous grid-edge controls. In the DEHC architecture, the advanced distribution management system (ADMS) controls the legacy devices (such as load tap changers and capacitor banks), the PV smart inverters are dispatched by real-time optimal power flow, and the grid-edge devices regulate local voltages in coordination with each other. The DEHC is demonstrated using a commercial ADMS platform, real utility distribution feeder models, and grid-edge devices. The performance of the DEHC architecture is evaluated using simulations and hardware-in-the-loop experiments with voltage regulation as the control objective. The results show that the DEHC enables high penetration levels of PV in distribution feeders by effectively managing system voltages through the synergistic operation of ADMS, distributed PV smart inverter controls, and secondary-level grid-edge device control.

Natural disasters (e.g., hurricanes) can cause widespread power outages within distribution networks and interrupted power supply to critical loads (e.g., grocery stores, hospitals, gas, fire, and police stations) that provide utility services. Microgrids are localized power grids that can incorporate solar/photovoltaic (PV) distributed generators (PV-DGs) and energy storage systems (ESSs) for stand-alone system operations independent of the main grid, known as the island mode. This study investigates a microgrid design problem using PV-DGs and ESSs when facing prolonged power outages in the main grid. We propose a multi-stage stochastic program that holistically considers the techno-economics of microgrid investment and daily operations by optimizing the reliability and resilience of the microgrid during a week-long power outage. The model is designed from a utility perspective that includes budget constraints for investment. Due to the large model size, we develop a nested L-shaped algorithm that solves the problem exactly and analyzes the microgrid’s reliability across different weather scenarios in the entire decision-making horizon. Results from a case study using real-world data show that an islanded utility-scale microgrid can effectively provide uninterrupted power supply to a network of 5 and 10 critical loads, covering 100% and 97% of the demand in all possible future scenarios, with potential investments of $8 million and $15 million, respectively.

Each quarter, the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) conducts the Quarterly Solar Industry Update, a presentation of technical trends within the solar industry Each presentation focuses on global and U.S. supply and demand, module and system price, investment trends and business models, and updates on U.S. government programs supporting the solar industry.

Science is an occupation as well as an intellectual endeavour. This fact is extremely well known, but its consequences have been little explored by historians of science. Sociologists such as Merton, Hagstrom, and Storer have argued that occupational rewards motivate a scientist to publish and thereby further the intellectual ends of the scientific community. Yet, as I have shown in a recent paper, such rewards can also lead to work which is hasty, superficial, and blindly uncritical of the dominant paradigm. Thus the relationship between career motivation and genuine intellectual achievement must be regarded as problematic at best.

Protective relays in electric power grids recognize the types of electrical faults in a few seconds. The most common detection method to detect the types of electrical faults is based on measuring the angle between the zero and negative sequence currents. However, it is not completely accurate because the phase-to-phase-ground and phase-to-ground electrical faults could have the same detection conditions. Therefore, engineers need to plot the events after an electrical fault to observe the nature of the incidents in detail. In this study, the phase-to-ground fault apparent (PGFA) admittance method with phase/ground boundaries identified the types of electrical faults located in distribution power lines and feeders. This method was based on measuring the PGFA admittance magnitudes for the faulted and nonfaulted phases, resulting in greater than zero and near zero, respectively. The PGFA admittance algorithm was built with MATLAB/Simulink software and tested with signature library and grid simulation events. The PGFA method with phase/ground boundaries was evaluated with the confusion matrix. The measured and predicted values matched in more than 90% of the tests, and the PGFA admittance method with phase/ground boundaries presented an accuracy of 94.3% and a precision of 100%.

This plan outlines research activities that can enable safe and environmentally sound handling of photovoltaic end-of-life materials.

Electric Power Systems are undergoing rapid transformations toward those having increasing proportions of renewable generation (such as wind and solar), significant amounts of energy storage, advanced grid infrastructures, and a myriad of end-use electrification technologies. Driven by drastic cost reductions and deployment incentives, the solar contribution to U.S. electricity generation has increased from less than 0.1&#x0025; in 2010 to 3.3&#x0025; in 2020. Wind generation has seen similar trends in cost reduction and accounted for 8.4&#x0025; of U.S. electricity generation in 2020. [See Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) - U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA), &#x201C;What is U.S. electricity generation by energy source?,&#x201D; eia.gov/tools/faqs/.] To achieve the Biden administration&#x2019;s clean energy goals, hundreds of gigawatts more of wind and solar will need to come online in the next 15 years. Similar transformations are happening at a global scale, and countries have laid out pathways to achieve a net-zero energy sector by 2050 to tackle climate change. (See 2 Net Zero by 2050: A Roadmap for the Global Energy Sector, <uri>https://www.iea.org/events/net-zero-by-2050-a-roadmap-for-the-global-energy-system</uri>.)

Legacy Protection and Control (P&C) Systems are vulnerable to misoperations due to a variety of reasons: miscoordination, complexity, human error, and hidden failures. Adding to these, the characteristics of the power system are changing due to the addition of inverter-interfaced generation. Inverters have different characteristics than synchronous machines when responding to faults or disturbances, and the logic of commonly applied P&C systems may fail to operate as expected. Some recent relay misoperations have been attributed to inverter-interfaced resources.

NJBPU (8/16/23); PV Magazine (8/7/23, 8/24/23, 8/28/23); PV Tech (8/18/23); RMI, State Climate Scorecards (2023); Utility Dive (8/8/23) Map shows progress toward installed wind + PV capacity by 2030 compatible with the U.S. Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) under the Paris Agreement, as modeled

This report provides updated generally accepted accounting principles (GAAP) parameter estimates of assumptions that may be used to reflect the cost of financing hydrogen infrastructure deployment. The report also provides parameter estimation for more streamlined financial analysis frameworks such as discounted cash flow and annualized financial models. Parameter values are derived from industry feedback and are reflective of current macro-economic factors such as higher interest rates and higher risk profile of emerging hydrogen technologies, given a myriad of factors such as projects’ construction inexperience, capital costs, and rising inflation, among others.

With support from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) Solar Energy Technologies Office (SETO), the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) partnered with Peak Reliability to evaluate the impact of the August 21, 2017 total solar eclipse on the reliability and grid operations in the Western Electricity Coordinating Council (WECC) territory.