Researchers at the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems (ISE) have developed a solution that combines power from renewable sources with electricity from the public grid and uses batteries to compensate for fluctuations.

The approach is expected to benefit companies that aim to invest in sustainability with photovoltaics and reduce their energy costs in the process.

One of the major challenges facing the widespread adoption of renewables is the fluctuating output of photovoltaic systems.

For energy-intensive companies especially, this means that their distribution networks are rapidly becoming inadequate.

“We are developing a solution that companies in the manufacturing industry can use to combine photovoltaics with battery storage in order to supplement their energy and power needs,” explains Felix Stortz, a research scientist in the Applied Storage Systems group at Fraunhofer ISE.

The software is fed consumption data from all manufacturing machines, as well as data on the status and charging capacity of the batteries that are charged using solar power.

The energy management system can then determine how much power the on-site batteries can supply and how much power must be drawn from the public grid, the researchers explained.

Smart energy management helps avoid the need for major investments, such as installing new power lines.

As a result, companies can plan how much energy they can expect from their photovoltaic systems and how much will have to be drawn from the public power grid.

Wind and solar power outputs fluctuate, making energy management a complex task. In this context, batteries are set to play an important role in solving this problem.

If industrial companies with photovoltaic systems are installed on their roofs, they can successfully combine self-produced electricity generated from photovoltaics with electricity from public grids, from which they stand to benefit enormously.

One core component of this solution is its integrated load management.

While energy management is the primary tool involved in the overall strategy of producing and consuming energy from various sources, load management serves as a tool for reacting to consumption peaks.

The Fraunhofer experts used the programming language Python to program the load management solution, which provides complete transparency.

The system runs on industrial PCs using standard interfaces.

The researchers at Chalmer’s University of Technology, Sweden, have developed a solution-and-neat-film-based Molecular Solar Thermal energy storage system (MOST) to capture solar energy and convert it into electricity on demand.

In the new technology developed by the team, solar energy can be stored as chemical energy and released as heat with microfabricated thermoelectric generators (TEG) to produce electricity in the absence of sunlight.

Researchers at the National Institute of Technology, Kurukshetra claimed to have developed a new method to regulate direct current voltage for grid-connected solar photovoltaic plus battery energy storage systems.