Abstract

Photovoltaics has become the cheapest source of electricity, almost globally, but with growing installations it becomes disruptive for the existing system of electricity generation. Often, electricity from PV is discarded because baseload plants cannot change their generation with the flexibility that would be needed to accept electricity from PV. Moreover, as electricity costs from baseload are mostly from fixed costs, adoption of PV is decreasing profits. We have developed a system where PV instead is used to meet all peak load demand above a given level. We demonstrate this system for a European EU27 yearly load curve. Here, one cable to a suitable country on the southern hemisphere allows to get rid of excess electricity generation in summer and to meet all peak load demand throughout the year at costs that are considerably below present peak costs. This makes PV highly compatible with the present system and highly desirable from an economic perspective. Moreover, this system allows a gradual increase of the share of solar electricity such that PV always only meets peak load, although increasing shares of the overall load. We found that Argentine is a suitable country due to its extension over almost 30 degrees of latitude. Through an interhemispheric connection, electricity generation can take advantages of all strength of PV, i.e. ist low costs of electricity, longevity, low need for maintenance and low environmental and aesthetical impacts. Once this method is proven, more countries on both hemispheres can be connected which would progressively lower electricity costs for all participating countries down to about US cent 3 per kilowatt hour for 24/7 meeting of actual demand.