Impact of PV penetration in a distribution grid: A Middle-East study case

A large diffusion of RES based distributed generation into the grid can represent an economic driver in the Middle-East area where the environmental conditions permit high level of producibility especially for photovoltaic (PV) systems. Moreover reduced installation costs of PV modules represent a further and strong driver to increase the PV market as well as the PV penetration in that area. However, a significant penetration of PV installation into the distribution grid can cause possible line congestion and/or voltage raise reducing the grid stability and the power quality levels. For these reasons, economic driver for PV market as feed-in tariff should be opportunely modulated and adapted to avoid possible critical grid operation. In this view, an evaluation of the maximum installable PV plant must be conducted to understand the real PV potential into a distribution grid. This paper intends to evaluate the maximum PV exploitation and its impact into the grid in the particular context of Hebron city in Palestine within the Renewable Energy for Palestine (RENEP) project, funded by the Palestinian Municipality Support Program (PMSP) of the Italian Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation. The analysis is performed by means of load-flow simulation handled by NEPLAN simulator. The grid, loads and PV production are modelled and violation of grid limits (i.e. line congestion, MV/LV substation overload and voltage raise) are monitored for different level of PV penetration factors. The maximum installable power into the grid at LV and MV level were evaluated under the hypothesis of uniform distribution of PV installations.