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• Comprehensive review on individual and hybrid wind-solar energy policy. • Evolution and current status of Indian wind and solar energy policy framework. • Techno-economic parameters for the hybridization of wind and solar power projects. • Barriers and recommendation regarding renewable energy policies. Wind and solar energy are currently the most prominent and reliable sources of renewable energy. Wind and solar power deployment largely depend on government policies and have a specific policy and regulatory provisions. The declaration of hybrid wind–solar policy has changed the dynamics of individual wind and solar power projects by introducing the scope for developing hybrid power projects to harness wind and solar energy simultaneously. The techno-economic structure and the existing scenarios of the fractional contribution of wind and solar sectors are going to play an important role in the development of hybrid power projects. This paper aims to present a comprehensive review of the impact of the existing individual wind and solar energy policies along with the recently declared hybrid policy in India and how this hybrid policy will affect the techno-economic structure of the existing and new power projects. Further, various kind of barriers faced by project developers while establishing renewable energy-based power projects and recommendations which can be practically implemented have been elaborated to facilitate and achieve the faster deployment of wind and solar power generation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Today the global energy industry is undergoing major changes shifting towards the green growth and circular economy solutions. The paper offers the outcomes of the foresight study of the Russian renewable energy sector and focuses on three areas: converting solar energy into electricity; converting wind energy into electricity; and converting biomass into thermal energy and electricity. The goal of the study was to foresee and agree on the visionary future for the nascent renewable energy sector in the country, as well as to provide the scientifically justified grounds for government and corporate decision-makers. The research is based on a mixture of methods: bibliometric analysis and text mining, literature review, expert surveys and interviews, workshops, STEEPV analysis of trends, scenario analysis, and applied policy analysis. As a result of the study, major trends and uncertainties that may affect the Russian and global renewable energy sector in the next 15–20 years were identified. Other results include the scenarios for Russia's renewable energy sector that are proposed together with recommendations for the Russian companies and public authorities. The study's policy and market implications go beyond Russia: the outcomes may be useful for similar studies, early stage renewable energy policy planning and investment decision. • The foresight study of the Russian renewable energy sector is presented. • The focus is on solar, wind and biomass energy production until 2035. • Four scenarios of the Russian renewable energy sector are discussed. • Recommendations may be used in research, policy planning and investment decisions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper deals with the simultaneous scheduling of electrical vehicles and responsive loads to reduce operation cost and emission in presence of wind and PV powers in microgrid. In the proposed method, the electrical vehicles are used for peak shaving and load curve modification while the responsive loads are employed to supply the reserves needed to compensate the intrinsic uncertainties of wind and PV powers. Furthermore, a developed two-stage model is proposed to determine the expected operation cost of microgrid (energy and reserve). In the first stage, the generation and reserve power costs are minimized while in the second stage, the costs associated with unit scheduling changes resulting from wind and PV power variations are minimized. The proposed model is implemented in a microgrid with various distributed generations. The simulation results have shown that the incorporation of electrical vehicles and responsive loads leads to decrease the system operation costs and emissions while the uncertainties related to wind and PV are compensated. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Ambitious policy targets together with current and projected high growth rates indicate that future power systems will likely show substantially increased generation from renewable energy sources. A large share will come from the variable renewable energy (VRE) sources wind and solar photovoltaics (PV); however, integrating wind and solar causes challenges for existing power systems. In this paper we analyze three major integration challenges related to the structural matching of demand with the supply of wind and solar power: low capacity credit, reduced utilization of dispatchable plants, and over-produced generation. Based on residual load duration curves we define corresponding challenge variables and estimate their dependence on region (US Indiana and Germany), penetration and mix of wind and solar generation. Results show that the impacts of increasing wind and solar shares can become substantial, and increase with penetration, independently of mix and region. Solar PV at low penetrations is much easier to integrate in many areas of the US than in Germany; however, some impacts (e.g. over-production) increase significantly with higher shares. For wind power, the impacts increase rather moderately and are fairly similar in US Indiana and Germany. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Integrating variable and non-dispatchable renewable power generation into existing power systems will have consequences for their operation and future expansion. These impacts will depend on two factors: (1) the variability of the total renewable power generation on different time scales and (2) the possibilities of accurately forecasting these fluctuations. In this paper, previous research on variability assessment and forecasting of solar, wind, wave and tidal energy resources is reviewed. The aim is to summarize the state of knowledge in each area and to compare the approaches used for the respective resources. For temporal variability, methods and models used for assessing the variability are surveyed, as well as what is known about the variability at individual sites and for larger aggregates of sites. For forecasting, an overview of forecasting methods for the different resources is made, and selected forecasting methods are compared over different time horizons. An important finding is that it is hard to draw strong conclusions from the existing studies due to differences in approaches and presentation of results. There is a need for further, more coherent studies that analyze the variability for the different resources in comparable ways, using data with the same resolution, and for studies that evaluate the smoothing effect and complementarity of combinations of several renewable energy resources. For forecasting, future research should suggest ways to evaluate forecasts from different renewable energy sources in easily comparable ways, using data from the same locations or regions, with the same temporal and spatial resolution, and with comparable metrics for the forecasting errors. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A significant number of Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) analyses of renewable energy technologies is available in the literature, even though there is a lack of consistent conclusions about the life cycle impacts of the different technologies. The reported results vary consistently, according to the size and the technology of the considered plant, thus limiting the utility of LCA to inform policy makers and constituting a barrier to the deployment of a full awareness on sustainable energies. This variability in LCA results, in fact, can generate confusion regarding the actual environmental consequences of implementing renewable technologies. The article reviews approximately 50 papers, related to more than 100 different case studies regarding solar energy (Concentrated Solar Power, Photovoltaic), wind power, hydropower, and geothermal power. A methodology for the harmonization of the results is presented. The detailed data collection and the results normalization and harmonization allowed a more reliable comparison of the various renewable technologies. For most of the considered environmental indicators, wind power technologies turn out to be the low end while geothermal and PV technologies the high end of the impact range where all the other technologies are positioned. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Distributed energy storage is a solution for increasing self-consumption of variable renewable energy such as solar and wind energy at the end user site. Small-scale energy storage systems can be centrally coordinated by "aggregation" to offer different services to the grid, such as operational flexibility and peak shaving. This paper shows how centralized coordination vs. distributed operation of residential electricity storage (home batteries) could affect the savings of owners. A hybrid method is applied to model the operation of solar photovoltaic (PV) and battery energy storage for a typical UK householder, linked with a whole-system power system model to account for long-term energy transitions. Based on results, electricity consumers can accumulate greater savings under centralized coordination by between 4 and 8% when operating no technology, by 3-11% with electricity storage alone, by 2-5% with stand-alone solar PV, while 0-2% with PV-battery combined. Centralized coordination of home batteries offers more optimized electricity prices in the system, and as such, higher private savings to all consumers. However, consumers without onsite energy technologies benefit more than PV-battery owners. Therefore, based on system-level benefits of aggregation, the regulator should incentivize prosumers with PV-battery, who are able to balance their electricity supply-demand even without central coordination, to let their storage be controlled centrally. Possible revenues of storage owners from ancillary services as well as the cost of aggregation (e.g., transaction fees charged by aggregators) are not considered in this analysis. • Centralized coordination vs. distributed operation of residential solar PV-battery is discussed. • Centralized coordination offers greater savings to prosumers, especially, under time of use tariffs. • Value of home batteries is dependent on the need for flexibility in the energy system in long term. • Consumers without battery benefit from the impact of "storage coordination" on power prices, more than battery owners themselves. • Private benefits of storage aggregation drops by 20% if aggregated storage devices increase five-fold. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]