An Analysis of Solar Inverter Ratios, Battery Inverter Ratios, and Their Effects on Capacity Factor and Economics of a DC-Coupled PV/BESS Site

• Published in: 2023 IEEE PES Innovative Smart Grid Technologies Latin America (ISGT-LA) pp. 270 - 274
• Main Authors: Hutchinson, Andrew. J., Gladwin, Daniel. T.
• Format: Conference Proceeding
• Language: English
• Published: IEEE 06-11-2023
• Subjects: Batteries; Battery energy storage system; co-location; dc coupling; Economics; energy storage; Frequency response; inverter ratios; Inverters; Sensitivity analysis; Smart grids
• ISSN: 2643-8798
• DOI: 10.1109/ISGT-LA56058.2023.10328358

The increase in Solar Generation deployment and the corresponding generation profiles they provide presents many opportunities for different deployment strategies and co-location with other technologies such as Battery Energy Storage Systems. A key design characteristic is the Solar Inverter Ratio, as well as the Battery Inverter Ratio for co-located sites. In this novel set of works, a sensitivity analysis is performed on the effects that changing the SIR and BIR can have on increasing the techno-economic performance of a solar installation where it is shown that up to an additional 0.92GWh of energy could be exported from a 5MW solar site by co-locating with a BESS and increasing the SIR. Following this, a first-of-its-kind study is undertaken into utilizing a DC-coupled BESS to provide frequency response services using the otherwise clipped energy from a high SIR site, showing the potential for significant economic improvements.