Accelerating Distributed Solar and Battery Storage Adoption in India Through Tariff Reforms and Community Grids: A Utility-Prosumer Perspective
摘要
In this chapter, we explore tariff rationalization and community grids as strategies to accelerate the adoption of distributed solar and battery storage in India. Our proposal includes a new Time-of-Use (ToU) tariff structure, which incorporates solar generation and electricity market dynamics and incentivizes prosumers through a market-linked dynamic Feed-in Tariff (FiT). We compare individual and community-based approaches to electricity pricing and solar photovoltaic (SPV) system installation to show that community-scale projects offer greater financial benefits than individual projects. Additionally, our analysis determines the subsidies and incentives necessary for the financial viability of Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS) for different consumer categories. Our study uses real data from Indian consumers and the country’s utility and electricity market to demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed methodologies. The results indicate that these strategies improve grid resilience, facilitate SPV integration, and provide financial benefits to both utilities and consumers/prosumers.