Techno-economic comparison of a schedule-based and a forecast-based control strategy for residential photovoltaic storage systems in Germany

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Technical and economic comparison of grid supportive vanadium redox flow batteries for primary control reserve and community electricity storage in Germany

Aquesta és una còpia de la versió author’s final draft d'un article publicat a la revista [International journal of energy research]. URL d'aquest document a UPCommons E-prints: http://hdl.handle.net/2117/127058Primary control reserve and maximising self-consumption are currently two of the main applications for large-scale battery storage systems. Although being currently the most profitable application for large-scale batteries in Germany, storage systems applying primary control reserve have not been implemented in a grid supportive manner in distribution grids yet. Despite a current unfavourable regulatory framework and reimbursement scheme for community electricity storages in Germany, they are potentially more profitable than residential storages, which is mainly due to their economy of scale, and thus they may become the major large scale battery application in the future. The two applications: primary control reserve and maximising self-consumption, are combined with a grid supportive behaviour by providing reactive power control and/or peak shaving and are fitted to a vanadium redox flow battery prototype, which is installed in a distribution grid in southern Germany. Based on measured data from the prototype, two battery models for two different time resolutions (1s, 1min) are presented in detail along with their respective operation models. The operation strategy model for primary control reserve comprises the so-called degrees of freedom used to reduce the energy needed to recharge the battery. The operation strategy to maximise self-consumption is based on a persistence forecast. The model for the operation strategy for a grid supportive primary control reserve was validated in a field test revealing a relative error of 2.5 % between the simulated and measured state of charge of the battery for a multi-week time period. The technical assessment of both applications shows that the use of the degrees of freedom can reduce the energy to recharge the battery by 20 %; and in the case of self-consumption, the curtailment losses can be kept under 1 %. The economic assessment, however, indicates that even for the most promising primary control reserve case, the investment costs of vanadium redox flow batteries must be reduced by at least 30 % in order to break even. Finally, the encouraging key finding is that the negative impact of a grid supportive behaviour, additionally to its primary purpose, is less than 1 % of the revenues. This may encourage distribution grid and battery operators to consider the integration of large scale batteries in distribution grids as part of the solution of a rising share of a decentralised renewable energy generation.Postprint (author's final draft

Techno-economic assessment of flexibility options versus grid expansion in distribution grids

In this paper five different flexibility options are analysed from a techno-economic perspective as alternatives to traditional grid expansion for a specific distribution grid in Germany. The options are: two reactive power control strategies with photovoltaic inverters (as a function of the power feed-in, or of the voltage at the connection point), one residential and two large scale battery storage applications (primary control reserve with autonomous reactive power control or self consumption maximisation strategy with autonomous reactive power control). For the pilot grid located in Southern Germany a photovoltaic expansion pathway is determined. The main goal of this work is to quantify the grid expansion actions that can be avoided by applying these five flexibility options for the assumed expansion pathway, focusing on large scale battery storages. It is shown that the five flexibility options increase the hosting capacity for PV systems, compared to a scenario without, by up to 45%. Furthermore, the results of the economic assessment indicate that the analysed flexibility options might be a viable alternative to traditional grid expansion as all of them show a cost reduction potential for the pilot region. These results could encourage DSOs to consider the integration of additional PV and battery storage systems not as a problem which triggers grid expansion, but as part of the solution reducing future grid expansion costs.Objectius de Desenvolupament Sostenible::7 - Energia Assequible i No ContaminantPostprint (author's final draft

Disulfiram, an Option for the Treatment of Pathological Gambling?

Aim: Pathological gambling and comorbid alcohol dependence often occur in combination. Disulfiram is one of the proven drugs for alcohol dependence. In addition to its inhibiting acetaldehyde dehydrogenase, disulfiram inhibits dopamine β-hydroxylase and may thereby increase dopamine and decrease norepinephrine cerebral concentrations. Because there may be common neurochemical substrates and neuronal circuits for pathological gambling and addiction, we wished to explore the effect of disulfiram in gambling. Method: We describe the outcome of a patient with alcohol dependence and pathological gambling treated with disulfiram D. Results: During treatment with disulfiram, the patient reported that his desire to gamble disappeared entirely. Follow-up indicated that he has not gambled for >12 months. Conclusions: Although uncontrolled case observations should be interpreted with caution, disulfiram deserves further investigation in pathological gamblin

Societies Drifting Apart? Behavioural, Genetic and Chemical Differentiation between Supercolonies in the Yellow Crazy Ant Anoplolepis gracilipes

Background: In populations of most social insects, gene flow is maintained through mating between reproductive individuals from different colonies in periodic nuptial flights followed by dispersal of the fertilized foundresses. Some ant species, however, form large polygynous supercolonies, in which mating takes place within the maternal nest (intranidal mating) and fertilized queens disperse within or along the boundary of the supercolony, leading to supercolony growth (colony budding). As a consequence, gene flow is largely confined within supercolonies. Over time, such supercolonies may diverge genetically and, thus, also in recognition cues (cuticular hydrocarbons, CHC’s) by a combination of genetic drift and accumulation of colony-specific, neutral mutations. Methodology/Principal Findings: We tested this hypothesis for six supercolonies of the invasive ant Anoplolepis gracilipes in north-east Borneo. Within supercolonies, workers from different nests tolerated each other, were closely related and showed highly similar CHC profiles. Between supercolonies, aggression ranged from tolerance to mortal encounters and was negatively correlated with relatedness and CHC profile similarity. Supercolonies were genetically and chemically distinct, with mutually aggressive supercolony pairs sharing only 33.1%617.5% (mean 6 SD) of their alleles across six microsatellite loci and 73.8%611.6% of the compounds in their CHC profile. Moreover, the proportion of alleles that differed between supercolony pairs was positively correlated to the proportion of qualitatively different CHC compounds. These qualitatively differing CHC compounds were found across various substance classes including alkanes, alkenes and mono-, di- and trimethyl-branched alkanes. Conclusions: We conclude that positive feedback between genetic, chemical and behavioural traits may further enhance supercolony differentiation through genetic drift and neutral evolution, and may drive colonies towards different evolutionary pathways, possibly including speciation

Comparison of control strategies of residential PV storage systems

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Causative classification of river flood events

A wide variety of processes controls the time of occurrence, duration, extent, and severity of river floods. Classifying flood events by their causative processes may assist in enhancing the accuracy of local and regional flood frequency estimates and support the detection and interpretation of any changes in flood occurrence and magnitudes. This paper provides a critical review of existing causative classifications of instrumental and preinstrumental series of flood events, discusses their validity and applications, and identifies opportunities for moving toward more comprehensive approaches. So far no unified definition of causative mechanisms of flood events exists. Existing frameworks for classification of instrumental and preinstrumental series of flood events adopt different perspectives: hydroclimatic (large‐scale circulation patterns and atmospheric state at the time of the event), hydrological (catchment scale precipitation patterns and antecedent catchment state), and hydrograph‐based (indirectly considering generating mechanisms through their effects on hydrograph characteristics). All of these approaches intend to capture the flood generating mechanisms and are useful for characterizing the flood processes at various spatial and temporal scales. However, uncertainty analyses with respect to indicators, classification methods, and data to assess the robustness of the classification are rarely performed which limits the transferability across different geographic regions. It is argued that more rigorous testing is needed. There are opportunities for extending classification methods to include indicators of space–time dynamics of rainfall, antecedent wetness, and routing effects, which will make the classification schemes even more useful for understanding and estimating floods

Automated identification of potential snow avalanche release areas based on digital elevation models

The identification of snow avalanche release areas is a very difficult task. The release mechanism of snow avalanches depends on many different terrain, meteorological, snowpack and triggering parameters and their interactions, which are very difficult to assess. In many alpine regions such as the Indian Himalaya, nearly no information on avalanche release areas exists mainly due to the very rough and poorly accessible terrain, the vast size of the region and the lack of avalanche records. However avalanche release information is urgently required for numerical simulation of avalanche events to plan mitigation measures, for hazard mapping and to secure important roads. The Rohtang tunnel access road near Manali, Himachal Pradesh, India, is such an example. By far the most reliable way to identify avalanche release areas is using historic avalanche records and field investigations accomplished by avalanche experts in the formation zones. But both methods are not feasible for this area due to the rough terrain, its vast extent and lack of time. Therefore, we develop an operational, easy-to-use automated potential release area (PRA) detection tool in Python/ArcGIS which uses high spatial resolution digital elevation models (DEMs) and forest cover information derived from airborne remote sensing instruments as input. Such instruments can acquire spatially continuous data even over inaccessible terrain and cover large areas. We validate our tool using a database of historic avalanches acquired over 56 yr in the neighborhood of Davos, Switzerland, and apply this method for the avalanche tracks along the Rohtang tunnel access road. This tool, used by avalanche experts, delivers valuable input to identify focus areas for more-detailed investigations on avalanche release areas in remote regions such as the Indian Himalaya and is a precondition for large-scale avalanche hazard mapping