An assessment on the impacts of photovoltaic systems on operational costs of the grid - The case of the state of Georgia

One of the main issues related to photovoltaic systems is the overall system cost. Therefore, it is very important to develop the right energy policies to incentive its implementation. This study analyses the hypothetical impacts of photovoltaic systems in the operational cost of the grid of the State of Georgia. Spinning reserve is modeled as ten gas power plants providing together equal capacity whose costs are stochastically calculated. The economic emissions dispatch is then calculated to obtain the hourly distribution of the annual generation. Also, the daily operation of PV and gas turbines in minute resolution is simulated to obtain results from the standpoint of costs imposed by rapid changes of PV output and use of spinning reserve in comparison with the results obtained when spinning reserve is not used. The results indicate that with current costs, significant reduction of emissions occurs as expected, however the total production costs increases.