Increasingly, there are calls for the owners of photovoltaic (PV) systems to pay additional charges on the basis that they are not contributing their fair share to network revenue. Air conditioners (A/Cs) are even more widespread than distributed PV systems, and their use has increased demand peaks and the size of networks required to meet them, the cost of which is typically recovered from all customers. There appears to be limited analysis in the literature regarding the impacts of A/C and PV on the electricity bills of customers who do not have these technologies. While the impacts of renewable energy on centralised electricity generation have been explored in the literature, this paper proposes a methodology to estimate the financial impacts of PV and A/C that flow through network operators to other customers. The analysis indicates that, in the datasets used, A/C systems have most likely resulted in significant bill increases for customers who don’t have them. In contrast, PV systems have most likely had a minimal financial impact on customers who do not have them. While these analyses were undertaken using Australian data, the method is applicable to most countries with modifications to suit the local regulatory environment.

Community Renewable Energy (CRE) projects can play a pivotal role in providing universal energy access and rural sustainable development for off-grid communities in developing countries (DCs). To date, CRE initiatives have not been universally successful, and no accepted metrics for monitoring and evaluation of impacts and project outcomes are available. Hence, a review was conducted exploring the discourses around CRE initiatives in DCs and examining options for assessing project impacts and results. Assessment alternatives found were categorised into general and specific approaches. Interestingly: a) measurements related to specific challenges and success factors within CRE projects are frequently overlooked within available assessment frameworks; b) evaluation options tend to focus either on sustainability assessments or technical-economic analyses, but not on an integration of both; and c) it seems there is a preference by authors for using indicator-based evaluations, but without community feedback. Consequently, a new capability-based framework is also presented to improve monitoring and evaluation of these initiatives and therefore assist decision and policymaking to support future deployment of CRE in DCs.

This paper presents a case study of a community renewable energy project implemented in the community of “Boca de Lura” located in rural Panama. This is a 2.17 kW stand-alone PV-Wind-Battery hybrid power system supplying energy to a local school also serving as a community facility. A novel sustainability assessment framework is used to examine the Boca de Lura experience and future perspectives for the power system and the project as a whole. The main challenges for Boca de Lura are discussed and recommendations to overcome some of the obstacles encountered are provided. Findings suggest that, even though the project was successfully implemented, its long-term operation is jeopardized due to non-technical aspects rather than technical ones. A potential solution is upgrading the stand-alone system into a minigrid; however, more studies and external advice are required to understand the implications for Boca de Lura, local institutions and possible national and international sponsors.

When a Renewable Energy (RE) power system is owned, operated or maintained by a community organisation, some of the problems associated with other rural electrification implementation models e.g. private or utility, can potentially be solved; including: lack of utility investment, barriers relating to social integration of RE technologies, lack of local maintenance capabilities, and end-user education. However, a range of challenges for community-based energy initiatives in developing countries are identified in the literature, often compromising the long-term operation of RE technologies and the sustainability of the project as a whole. Hence, questions arise around the set of community capabilities required, appropriate project design, and enabling external environment for sustainable Community RE (CRE) projects. Relatively longstanding CRE rural electrification experiences in Central America can offer useful insights on the challenges, capability requirements, and future perspectives for further deployment and governance of CRE initiatives in the developing world. In this study, a comparative analysis from case studies across Panama, Nicaragua and Costa Rica was undertaken after field investigation conducted over eight months. A cross-disciplinary method combining qualitative social research and techno-economic analysis of RE power systems was then used for data integration and sustainability assessment of selected case studies.

Community-based rural electrification initiatives have the potential to overcome some of the barriers to providing modern energy services in off-grid areas in developing countries, especially those barriers relating to social integration of renewable energy technologies, enduser education and local maintenance capabilities. However, experience to date with rural community energy projects has been mixed, and it is not clear which implementation models or community capabilities are required to deliver a sustainable and successful communitydriven energy venture (Madriz-Vargas, et al., 2015). A case study of the rural electric cooperative of Guanacaste R.L. (Coopeguanacaste) located in Costa Rica is presented. A capabilities framework is used to examine the Coopeguanacaste experience, current and future challenges, and the main factors influencing the success of the initiative. The aim of this case study is to contribute to the body of knowledge on capabilities needed, lessons learnt and future opportunities for community-based solutions for off-grid rural electrification, especially in developing regions such as Latin America and the Caribbean, sub-Saharan Africa and the Asia-Pacific.

Community Renewable Energy (CRE) projects from Central America can offer useful insights for further deployment of CRE for energy poverty alleviation in developing countries. Hence, an analysis of local capabilities supporting decision making processes, as well as common needs, barriers, and opportunities from CRE projects in Panama, Nicaragua and Costa Rica are presented after fieldwork conducted for 8 months in 2016. Findings highlight that the main needs and barriers are more related to legal, organisational, and political aspects rather than social, technical or environmental ones. Additionally, there are now opportunities for strategic planning, design, and supportive policy arrangements for new CRE initiatives, given the increasing availability of modern rural electrification technologies. Results from this study may help to inform policy making, support practical knowledge exchange, and create bridges for future research between CRE stakeholders across developing regions.

The remarkable growth in deployment of grid-connected photovoltaics (PV) in recent years has, in large part, been driven by its rapidly improving economics. System costs have fallen almost fourfold in some markets over the past five years. The future success of the technology will, however, depend on the value that it can contribute toward delivering affordable, reliable, secure, and sustainable energy services to end users. PV has some highly valuable characteristics in this regard. It can be deployed at almost any scale from household to utility plant, typically generates at times of higher demand and hence higher value, and has very low adverse environmental impacts. However, its variable and somewhat unpredictable generation does raise some challenges within an industry aspiring to ensure that supply must meet demand, at appropriate levels of quality, at all times and locations across the electrical network. These challenges become greater as the penetration of PV increases. Energy storage is inherently valuable in a power system, but direct storage of electrical energy, and distributed small-scale storage, have to date played only a limited role in most electricity industries, although they have been widely used for off-grid applications. Growing penetrations of PV in grids will create both a greater need for energy storage, but also new opportunities for distributed direct storage to play a valuable role in the industry. These opportunities include better managing end user demand patterns and aggregated network flows, improving end user reliability and power quality, and sharing balance of system components between PV and storage equipment. This chapter explores these opportunities, highlighting the diverse range of potential value propositions from integrating PV and storage, identifying how these different values might be estimated for particular contexts, and providing suggestions on market arrangements that would facilitate these economic opportunities actually being achieved.

Pacific Islands are at the forefront of the trend towards high or even 100% renewable energy penetration of their electricity grids. Many have been highly or totally reliant on imported diesel fuel, with associated price uncertainties and GDP impacts. Countries like Fiji are highly reliant on hydro power and become vulnerable in periods of low rainfall, such as during El Nino events, when diesel use increases. All Pacific Islands are prone to cyclones, making technology choice and installation requirements harder. In addition, transport of equipment, installation and maintenance can be extremely challenging, and further limit feasible options. Renewable energy-based electricity has the potential to improve the quality of life in many remote islands and also to stabilise power costs across the region. Many Pacific Island countries have introduced renewable energy targets or support policies and some, such as Tokelau, have successfully moved to 100% renewable supply, with a PV/battery system. Policy approaches across the region vary and are often complicated by reliance on aid funding, which in turn has its own drivers. In this paper we propose criteria for assessing the viability of renewable energy support programs, discuss some options suitable for use in Pacific Islands and examine the implications for electricity tariff setting.

In Australia, as electricity prices have increased, driven mainly by increases in peak demand, electricity use has decreased every year since 2008/09. The factors most responsible for these decreases include increased electricity costs, energy efficiency, solar water heaters and photovoltaics. Further increases in electricity prices and uptake of these technologies could result in further reductions in demand. This combined with the projected increases in peak demand and associated expenditure could put further pressure on utilities’ traditional revenue and business models, especially those of networks. Government responses to date to minimise electricity costs will most likely be ineffectual and are inconsistent with absolute reductions in electricity use. This is due to the limited attention given to alternatives to the Network Determination process used to establish future network expenditure, the lack of practical suggestions for decoupling network operators’ revenue from electricity use, and the treatment of distributed energy (energy efficiency, demand management and distributed generation) as an ‘add-on’ to the existing market. We propose the use of Integrated Resource Planning to ensure that distributed energy competes equally with network augmentation, and regulation of distribution network operators under a revenue cap and Overs and Unders process to decouple their revenue from electricity use, both in the context of a broader distributed energy market. We describe how all these arrangements can be integrated in such a way that results in competition between supply-side and demand-side options at all levels: generation, networks and retail. We also provide examples of the types of policies needed for this to occur, as well as the most important issues that would need to be addressed. The issues and approaches discussed here should be relevant to any country facing ongoing reductions in electricity use or high penetrations of distributed generation.