An International Comparison of the Economics of Building Integrated PV in different Resource, Pricing and Policy Environments: The Cases of the U.S., Japan and South Korea

Abstract

In recent years, the Center for Energy and Environmental Policy (CEEP), working with affiliated academic and research institutions in the U.S. and East Asia, has investigated the technical and economic feasibility of using dispatchable photovoltaic (DPV) systems in distributed peak-shaving (PS) applications. In each case, modest amounts of battery storage are used in conjunction with a PV array to achieve firm peak shaving for commercial building operators. Recent investigations have added emergency power as a second function of DPV-PS systems installed on commercial buildings. This paper reports on CEEP’s latest studies carried out in the US, Japan and South Korea which offer a cross-national review of the performance of dual-function DPV systems designed to serve peak shaving and emergency power needs of the commercial buildings sector. The market assessment results for each country are derived from PV Planner, a spreadsheet analytical tool developed at CEEP to run simulations of building integrated PV applications under different resource, pricing and policy environments. The analyses in all three countries rely on electricity load data from actual buildings, resource data for specific national locations, and actual electricity tariffs in use in each country. The paper recommends policies that can enable PV to compete as an energy service application in an international market.