A “New-Deal” for the Development of Photovoltaic Investments in Greece? A Parametric Techno-Economic Assessment

Abstract

Abstract:The aim of this paper is to identify the financial impact imposed by cost containment measures and especially by the feed in tariff (FiT) reduction upon the profitability of different photovoltaic (PV) investments and the electricity charge faced by consumers. A fully parametric analysis is carried out by varying the following parameters: total installation costs based on their activation date, interest rate for a bank loan, use of a construction subsidy, tax imposition levels, the solidarity surcharge differentiated by the activation and the purchase agreement date and the issuance of credit invoice. During the simulations the simple payback period, the internal rate of return and the profitability index were calculated for the most common investment cases. These were identified through empirical observations on the deployment of PV stations. The profitability of PV stations connected to the medium voltage network were by far affected the most by the cutback while farmers' PV stations and PV rooftop systems were comparatively less affected. Parameters such as the size of the station and the PV activation date were crucial for the assessment of the viability of PV stations. From a social perspective, the FiT cutback prevented an additional 40% increase in the electricity charge paid by electricity consumers.

Renewable Energy Sources Penetration in Greece: Characteristics and Seasonal Variation of the Electricity Demand Share Covering

“…It also stipulated the contracted FIT was to be maintained for a period of 18 months since the signature date of the PPA. Should the activation occur past the 18-month interval, the guaranteed tariff was no longer maintained and was set according to the provisions of the equivalent semester of its activation [20]. Finally, the concept of the floating-rate compensation over the system's margin price (SMP) for feed-in premium (FIP) for PV plant connections after 1 January 2015 was first introduced.…”

“…The cases that were excluded from this requirement were those that either had already submitted application for a PPA or had signed the agreement before the publication of Law 4093/2012. Finally, it required PV stations to be activated within four months after the implementation of the law, practically providing a short transitional period until March 2013 [20].…”

Identification and Analysis of Impact Factors on the Economic Feasibility of Photovoltaic Energy Investments

“…More specifically, Viana et al [4] consider several categories of consumers, based on the hours of electricity usage during the day, observing the peak hours. Finally, for Anagnostopoulos et al [105], the price of electricity by type of consumer varies to reflect as much as possible the real cost of generation and to reduce subsidies.…”

“…In Schopfer et al's work [66], the defined discount rate was 4%. In research by Anagnostopoulos et al [105], the selected discount rate was 5%, assuming that this rate is satisfactory for most investors in the economic situation in Greece, in which the interest rate is lower than the best alternative investments available. According to Macdougall et al [69], the addition of the risk premium (from 1% to 3%) provides a risk-adjusted discount rate of 5% to 7%.…”

An Application of Calibration and Uncertainty Quantification Techniques for Agent-Based Models

“…Accordingly, the model was calibrated on the data for the period from 2010 to 2013. This period was the period with the largest additions in small-scale PV capacity (Anagnostopoulos et al 2017;Papadelis et al 2016). The calibration data corresponds to: a) Past prices and market conditions (prices for small-scale PV systems and the relevant Greek feed-in tariff (FIT) prices) b) The requests for grid connections, the records for which are available at the individual request level 1…”