Renewable Energy 111 (2017) 332e343

Contents lists available at ScienceDirect

Renewable Energy
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/renene

Economic feasibility of residential and commercial PV technology: The

Chilean case
Gonzalo Ramrez-Sagner a, *, Carlos Mata-Torres b, Alan Pino a, Rodrigo A. Escobar b
a
Fraunhofer Chile Research, Center for Solar Energy Technologies, Av. Vicun ~ a Mackenna 4860, Macul, Santiago, Chile
b lica de Chile, Av. Vicun
Escuela de Ingeniera, Ponticia Universidad Cato ~ a Mackenna 4860, Macul, Santiago, Chile

a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t

Article history: This study presents an economic analysis of residential and commercial Photovoltaic (PV) systems in
Received 20 December 2016 Chile. Continental Chile presents good solar resource and is also an interesting country for developing PV
Received in revised form projects of all sizes (large-scale, commercial and residential). The analysis was performed on the two
17 March 2017
largest electric power systems, specically on the 314 districts of 13 regions of Chile, taking into account
Accepted 7 April 2017
Available online 7 April 2017
the actual Chilean regulatory framework. Economic performance results of the residential and com-
mercial PV systems were obtained and presented in geo referenced information systems (GIS) maps. The
results show that almost all the country exhibits a great potential, obtaining in several locations an IRR
Keywords:
Residential PV
higher than the reference value (5%/yr.) for both schemes (residential and commercial), highlighting that
Commercial PV the central-north region reaches the highest IRR values. It was found that districts can be characterized
PV economic feasibility by the electricity tariffs in clusters that increase the IRR linearly with the specic yield [kWh/kWp]. This
Chile study is of primordial importance for the development of renewable energies in the region, giving
further understanding on the economic feasibility of the photovoltaic technology throughout the
country.
2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

1. Introduction
Non-Conventional Renewable Energies (NCRE) have increased
their market share throughout the globes electricity markets. A
trend being principally led by wind and solar photovoltaic (PV)
technology. Particularly PV technology has had a sustained growth
in the last years, reaching 227 GW of global capacity in 2015, with
50 GW addition during the last year [1]. In several countries, this
growth has been pushed using subsidies such as feed-in-tariffs (FIT,
such as Germany, Spain and others), tax incentives for investment
and production of clean electricity (USA Production and Investment
Tax Credits) or Renewable Portfolio Standards [2]. This new de-
mand for PV energy has created more competition within tech-
nologies, higher pressure on Research, Development and
Innovation, further creation of new factories in Asia, and adapta-
tions to the change for older factories, by lowering the average price
for developing PV systems. In the last years, the cost reduction of
the PV technology has been extreme. The last reference evidence
that the cost of the PV modules is up to 0.5 USD/Wp or lower, and
* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: gonzalo.ramirez@fraunhofer.cl (G. Ramrez-Sagner).
the installation cost can be found between 1.0 and 1.5 USD/Wp for
utility and commercial scale, and 2.5e4.0 USD/Wp for residential
scale [3,4].
This reduction in prices has allowed countries with good solar
irradiation conditions to develop NCRE PV projects without the
help of support mechanisms or subsidies. This has been the case of
Chile which presents several features that make of it an interesting
country for developing PV projects of all sizes. This conditions are:
High solar irradiation in a large portion of its continental terrain
(Global Horizontal Irradiation-GHI above 2600 kWh/m2-year in the
North, and above 1600 kWh/m2-year in large part of the South)
[5,6], stable geopolitical conditions, an electricity market structure
which accounts with spot energy pricing and bilateral power pur-
chase agreement (PPA) markets, and steady electricity demand
growth. The growth of PV technology in Chile for utility-scale have
been important in the last 3 years, reaching an installed capacity of
1267 MW and 1676 MW under construction by July 2016 [7].
However, the residential and commercial PV segment has not seen
the same growth, despite the excellent conditions and high elec-
tricity rates located in some places of Chile.
The government can take a main role in developing policies to
promote residential and commercial PV installations. Among the

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2017.04.011
0960-1481/ 2017 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
 G. Ramrez-Sagner et al. / Renewable Energy 111 (2017) 332e343
regulations that foster the distributed electricity generation, the
most important ones are the Net Metering and Billing policies/
schemes. Net Metering consists on a policy/scheme that measures
net energy consumption or net energy injections, typically using a
bi-directional energy meter, where the energy exported (injected)
to the grid has the same commercial value as the energy imported
(purchased) from the grid. Net Billing consists on a similar scheme
as the Net Metering, with the difference that exported energy is
valued at a different tariff (can be higher or lower) [8e10]. These
policies/schemes are aimed to capitalize the surplus generation, or
mismatch between generation and consumption, creating a com-
mercial buffer which leverages the economic exercise for distrib-
uted generation systems. In Chile, specically, there is a Net Billing
policy since 2014 [11].
1.1. State of the art
Studying the economic feasibility of PV, Chilean case, is of highly
importance to understand and determine which place along the
country is more suitable for commercial and residential PV
installations.
Recent publications have addressed the issue of identifying the
countries with the best investment opportunities and considering
the new regulations. Rodrigues et al. [2] found that under scenarios
of 30e100% self-consumption, the best prots can be found in
Germany, Italy and Australia. The only South American country
under analysis was Brazil, where a Net-Metering scheme was
adopted together with a community solar concept, known as vir-
tual net-metering (VNM), which boosted commercial and resi-
dential PV. VNM shortly put means an installed energy system that
can be connected to different points at the electrical grid, in order
to give the end-users credits that can abate consumption costs from
another unit. In Indonesia, a techno-economic analysis of a resi-
dential installation was performed by Tarigan et al., obtaining an
IRR of 5.4% and a payback of 17.6 years with a net metering scheme
[12]. In Cyprus, Fokadies and Kylili analyze the feasibility of a PV
system, obtaining an IRR of at least 10.83% for all the parametric
analysis, concluding that a PV installation has protability poten-
tial, which is fundamentally a consequence of high electricity prices
(island system) [13].
Other concept that has been introduced in the literature to
evaluate the feasibility of residential PV is the Grid Parity, which is
dened as the threshold at which a grid connected renewable en-
ergy generation system source supplies electricity to the end user at
the same price as grid supplied electricity. This denition can be
more complex due to its sensitivity to political support (non-nu-
merical) and nancial parameters [13,14]. Breyer and Gerlach [15]
concluded that grid parity will be achieved globally within the
next decade, where rst events will occur on islands and regions of
high solar irradiation and high electricity prices. Biondi and Mor-
etto conclude that grid parity in Italy should be reached in 2015 for
private investor, while for public perspective, it should be already a
reality. However, the grid parity does not take into account the
decreasing PV installation and system cost and the network elec-
tricity prices uncertainty, parameters which can defer the
achievement of grid parity [16].
The potential of Renewable Energy has been evaluated by means
of GIS supported maps since the 90s [17], giving valuable help to
energy policy makers, utilities, local authorities and private in-
vestors worldwide. One of the main institutions that have devel-
oped these studies has been the National Renewable Energy
Laboratory (NREL). One example is the study from Fu et al. (NREL)
that performed an analysis where LCOE is modeled and spatially
presented on maps which take into account the regional cost for a
Utility-PV system [3,4]. Also, Solargis is one of the main companies
333
that provides satellite solar data over the world from elaborated
radiation models that they have developed. They have shown GHI
and Direct Normal Irradiation (DNI) maps for several regions and
countries that helps in the analysis of solar resource potential
[18,19]. In South America, there have also been works that evaluate
the solar resource potential. In Brazil, the National Institute for
Space Research (INPE for its Brazilian acronym) performed the
Atlas Brasileiro de Energia solar (Brazilian Atlas of Solar Energy),
that presents the methodology used to produce the solar maps
using the BRASIL-SR radiation model and elaborate the solar energy
resource assessment, where maps of 10
10 km2 spatial resolution
were generated for global, diffuse and direct normal solar irradia-
tion [20e22]. In Chile, several studies have been made for esti-
mating the solar resource assessment in recent years. One of those
studies was the Atlas Solar de Chile [23] that uses a methodology
to estimate the solar resource using the CHILE-SR radiation model
(similar to BRASIL-SR model but adapted for the Chilean weather
conditions) and presents maps of the solar resource [5,6].
In Chile, there are two main studies related to residential PV
feasibility. Campos et al. which evaluates the potential of distrib-
uted PV in urban cities in Chile. The results show that in the city of
Concepcion, PV can cover 90% of the annual electricity consump-
tion. Also, the PVs Levelized Cost Of Electricity (LCOE) in cities
seems to be cost-effective in comparison to regulated electricity
tariffs, hence, in the Chilean context PV has already reached grid-
parity in certain cities [24]. Watts et al. performed an analysis of
3 residential PV systems in 10 selected cities of Chile. The results
show that for the Net Billing policy the consumer will see an
advantage when energy is integrated over longer period of time
(increases the netting of consumption with generation). The re-
sults also highlight the benet of correctly sizing the PV systems
installed capacity in relation to the consumption proles, which
yields in larger self-consumption ratios of generated electricity.
This is a result of the Net Billing scheme which values the surplus
electricity at a lower price than the consumption rate. The results
also show that on average the payback period lays between 7.1 and
10.2 years, and IRRs lay between 7% and 14%. These results are
obtained for the 3 systems sizes. Northern areas, which account
with better solar irradiation conditions, yield minimum paybacks
of 6 years and maximum IRRs of 16% [25].
These studies address the issue of solar irradiation potential, as a
primary energetic resource and also as a business opportunity, but
do not really tackle the need for a global analysis which takes into
account the full regional potential, business segments (wholesale,
commercial and residential), electricity tariffs throughout the
analyzed territory and electricity infrastructure. This study ad-
dresses the current state of economic feasibility for solar PV sys-
tems in Chile under the actual conditions of development (solar
irradiation quality throughout the country, investment and main-
tenance costs, currently in force regulatory schemes, present retail
electricity prices), ranging from utility scale large solar arrays
(50 MWp), passing through commercial scale (up to 100 kWp) and
also the residential sector (1 kWp). This study takes special atten-
tion to the distributed segment, which accounts for commercial
and residential systems, expanding the analysis to 314 districts of
Chile located from Arica to Chiloe, where 98.5% of population live
and 99.2% of the national generation installed capacity is located
[26], to obtain the PV potential using GIS maps and locate the best
locations with greater economic feasibility.
This work is divided in ve main sections: Section 2 shows the
solar resource assessment for the main continental parts of Chile.
Section 3 describes the current Chilean regulatory framework of
the electricity market which denes the market boundaries for PV
technology. This chapter also details the current tariff structures
and regulation for distributed energy resources. Section 4 details
334 G. Ramrez-Sagner et al. / Renewable Energy 111 (2017) 332e343
the assumptions and economic analysis of developing commercial
and residential PV systems under the current regulatory frame-
work. Finally, in Section 5 the results and analysis are presented, in
which a sensitivity analysis is performed as an effort to understand
challenges and opportunities for the PV industry. At the end, in
Section 6, the discussion of the proposed analysis is done, followed
by Section 7, where conclusions are drawn from the exercise as an
effort for adding value to the current national energy discussion.
2. Chilean solar resource conditions
Continental Chile has a length of around 4200 km along the
south-west coast of South America (17.0 300 S to 56.0 S), with an
average width of 177 km. Its climate is dominated by the Andes
along its eastern edge and the Pacic Ocean to the west. To the
expected climate variation from north to south, the mentioned
geographical features along the entire country cause also pro-
nounced climate variation from east to west. Chile has the highest
solar irradiation levels around in the world due to these particular
climate conditions [6]. The Andes works as a 5000-m height wall
that prevents the wet air masses from the Amazon to reach the
Chilean territory. Also, the cold Humboldt Current coming from the
Antarctica runs throughout the Chilean coast (seawater at
11.0e14.0  C), thus the evaporation rate in the coastal area is lower
Fig. 1. GHI [kWh/m2-year] (left) and LCOE [USD/MWh] (right) distribution for Chile.
than in other zones of the World. These two effects are the main
responsible for having dry air and low presence of clouds inland,
hence reducing the atmospheric attenuation of the solar radiation.
In fact, the Atacama Desert is considered the most arid desert in the
world. In the northern part of Chile, an aggressive coastal range
separates the coastline climate from the inland. Hence the annual
GHI values for the coastline varies between 1800 and 2400 kWh/
m2-year whilst inland the GHI value reach up to 2700 kWh/m2-year
per year. The seasonal variation affects the daylight hours and
irradiation, yet in the Atacama Desert (22.4 S) the monthly average
of daily GHI reaches 9.1 kWh/m2-day in December (summer) and
4.8 kWh/m2-day in June (winter) [23,27]. For latitudes, higher than
30.0 south, the presence of vegetation increases and several val-
leys appear where the main urban centers and agricultural areas
are located. However, in Santiago (33.0 S), the capital city of Chile,
the annual GHI is comparable to the values of south Spain
(Almera~1870 kWh/m2-year), where many solar projects have
been developed including PV and Concentrated Solar Power (CSP).
Moreover, the annual GHI in Puerto Montt (41.0 S) is higher than in
south of Germany (Munich~1180 kWh/m2-year), country leading in
PV development for residential and industries appliances [18]. Fig. 1
details the georeferenced GHI values throughout continental Chile.
Given the previously mentioned irradiation conditions,
throughout continental Chile, an exemplary Levelized Cost of
 G. Ramrez-Sagner et al. / Renewable Energy 111 (2017) 332e343 335

Table 1 3. Chilean regulatory framework

Large scale base case parameters.

Description Unit Value The Chilean electric market regulation distinguishes three ac-
Discount Rate % 5.0
tivities: generation, transmission and distribution. The latter two
Investment Cost USD/Wp 1.1 are considered natural monopolies and their rates are regulated.
Evaluation Period Years 20 While the former is considered as an open market, that ideally
O&M Costs USD/kWp-year 30 would drive prices down by means of private competition.
Degradation %/year 0.5
The market structure considers a power pool that makes a
centralized least cost dispatch of the available generation pool. This
dispatch is made by the Independent System Operator (ISO) using
Table 2 audited variable costs and technical parameters of the generation
Regulated tariffs cost structure. park and transmission system. The main traded products in this
Tariff Scheme Energy [USD/kWh] Capacity [USD/kW-Month]
market are energy and power, with a small participation of auxil-
iary services.
LV1 Energy Capacity DAV e
This power pool uses Locational Marginal Prices (LMPs) as a tool
HV/LV2 Energy Capacity DAV
HV/LV3 Energy Capacity DAV for reecting marginal energy prices, transmission energy losses
HV/LV4 Energy Capacity DAV and bottle necks (decoupling of systems). Only generation com-
panies are allowed to trade energy at the spot market, thus bilateral
contracts are needed between generation companies/Distribution
Network Operators (DNOs) and the end consumers. This allows the
Electricity (LCOE) exercise if performed for understanding the decoupling of short term economic signals (spot energy prices) and
large-scale PV (multi MWp plant e over 3 MW- commercializing long term economic signals (efcient technology development
its production at the wholesale market) potential in Chile (see costs). This long term economic signal protects the end user from
Fig. 1). A large-scale PV plant with single-axis tracking system short term price variability and gives nancial certainty to
(north-south axis) was modeled using Solargis pvPlanner tool, investors.
considering the nancial parameters shown in Table 1. These
parameters were based on unpublished data supplied by project
developers and EPC enterprises in Chile. O&M considers a con-
servative value.
The LCOE is calculated according to the following equation
which have been adapted from MIT [28] and Darling et al. [29]:

P
Investment PVC$ Tt1 O&Mtt
1r
LCOEk PT SYk $ PVC$1DR$t (1)
t1 1rt

Where:

 LCOEk is the Levelized Cost of Electricity for the location k in

[USD/MWh].
 Investment is the overnight investment cost of the large-scale PV
plant in [USD].
 O&Mt the operational and maintenance cost per year in [USD/
kWp-year].
 SYk the specic yield in location k in [MWh/kWp].
 PVC the installed capacity of the PV plant in [kWp].
 DR the annual degradation ratio in [%/year].
 r the annual discount rate of the nancial exercise in [%].
 T the economic horizon of analysis in years.

The LCOE has been largely studied in the literature, where

several studies present the same structure of the equation, like
ndez-Moro and Martnez-Duart [31]. For
Short et al. [30] and Herna
more details, Darling et al. [29] and Branker et al. [32] studies gave
an extended explanation of the formulation. Although this is a
simplied version of an LCOE calculation (linear degradation, no
taxes, residual value and no incentives) it serves the purpose of
giving spatial information about the quality of the solar resource in
Chile.
The LCOEs presented in Fig. 1 are within the range of the
awarded PPAs during the last regulated clients auctions that have
taken place at the Chilean market [33], despite the choice of
moderate parameters for discount rate and investment cost. Fig. 2. LV1 (residential) price distribution for Chile (July 2016) in USD/MWh.
336 G. Ramrez-Sagner et al. / Renewable Energy 111 (2017) 332e343
Fig. 3. HV/LV4 (commercial) price distribution for Chile (July 2016) in USD/MWh.
3.1. Tariff structure
The Chilean electric regulation identies two types of end
consumers, the unregulated and the regulated clients. The former
present installed capacities larger than 2000 kW (between 500
and 2000 kW they can choose to be regulated clients) and have to
negotiate Power Purchase Agreements (PPAs) with generation
companies or with DNOs. This format allows a PPA to take any
format or structure (price, duration, indexation and general con-
ditions) negotiated by the two parties. The regulated clients, that
are the ones analyzed on this study, have a tariff dened by the
regulator. These tariffs are rstly divided depending on the
voltage level at which the client is connected (low or high
voltage). Secondly, they are subdivided on how to measure the
capacity use. LV1 tariffs charge all products: energy, capacity and
distribution added value (DAV: cost of the electric distribution
system infrastructure that allows to supply end regulated and
commercial customers, or last mile transmission cost) in an
energized scheme, HV/LV2 tariffs charge a xed contracted
amount of capacity, HV/LV3 tariffs charge the maximum used
capacity during the month and HV/LV4 tariffs are a mix between
contracted and measured with the acknowledgement of peak
hours, where the generation, transmission and distribution sys-
tems are stressed the most (see Table 2). Commonly the resi-
dential clients are restricted to the LV1 tariff, which has a limit of
10 kW of capacity. The other three tariff are used on the com-
mercial segment that has larger capacities.
As an effort to give complete geographical signals, this study
gathered all the DNO regulated tariffs from 314 Chilean districts
located in 13 regions (which is the geopolitical territorial division of
Chile) from Arica to Chiloe (excluding the Region XI of Ayse n and XII
of Magallanes and some district that has remote systems) in force
on July 2016 [34]. The studied area accounts for more than 98.5% of
the population, 99.2% of the generation installed capacity (up to
August 2016) and 93.4% of the electricity production in 2015 [26].
For electric distribution concession zones with more than one DNO,
a weighted average electricity price was calculated, relative to the
number of costumers that each DNO has on a given regulated area.
The geo-referenced retail prices, for both residential (LV1) and
commercial (HV/LV4) regulated users, are presented in Figs. 2 and 3
in USD/MWh, where a 680 CLP/USD exchange rate was used.
3.2. Distributed energy resources regulation
Before the approval of the Chilean Regulated Net-Billing Law
(Law 20.571) [11] in March 2012, the only mean to capitalize the
development of distributed generation was by performing self-
consumption exercises. Regulated clients could perform behind
the meter electric generation. This production would decrease the
effective volume of energy consumed by the client and charged by
the DNO, with the limitation that surplus generation injected back
to the grid would not be valued at any market price, limiting the
economic performance. In 2014, thanks to the publication of the
technical normative of Law 20.571, the Net-Billing Law came into
force, allowing NCRE energy or efcient co-generation systems, up
to 100 kW of electric capacity, to be installed behind the meter of
regulated clients. This law dened the economic value of the sur-
plus electricity injected back to the network. This price takes the
form of the value that regulated end users pay for energy con-
sumption without the Value-Added Tax (VAT) of 19% at their con-
sumption point (considers the regulated energy expansion loss
factors in force). It must be stated that energized tariffs (LV1) only
pay the Energy product value (without VAT) when surplus gen-
eration is re-injecting to the network, hence the Billing concept of
the law. For non-energized rates (non-LV1) the only difference
between the energy paid for consumption and injection is the VAT.
4. Commercial and residential PV economic analysis
This section details the assumptions, technical and economic
analysis performed to obtain the economic performance of a resi-
dential and commercial PV installation for the 314 districts evalu-
ated in this study.
4.1. Generation assumptions
The electric generation was modeled using Solargis pvPlanner
tool [18,35] for every analyzed city, considering optimal azimuth
and inclination for each geographical location. This tool considers
long-term annual and monthly average values of irradiation and
weather parameters like ambient temperature. The electric model
considers the installed capacity of the PV system, modeling the sun
path geometry and its in-plane global irradiation, which is calcu-
lated using the global horizontal and direct normal irradiation
database and the mounting system (xed or with tracking). Far
shading is also considered, which takes into account the near
slopes, hills and mountains existing in the region.
Depending on the type of modules selected, the tool models the
angular reections, at the surface of the modules. After modeling
the electric production, DC losses are added, which account for
 G. Ramrez-Sagner et al. / Renewable Energy 111 (2017) 332e343
pollution losses, mismatch, cables and interconnections. No local
soiling conditions are able to be dened due to the high spatial
specicity of this phenomenon. Inverter, AC losses and system
availability are also taken into consideration [35]. The exercise done
in this study considers a crystalline silicon system on a xed roof
mounted structure facing North with a tilt angle equal to the lati-
tude of each location, a yearly availability of 99% of the time, DC/AC
losses of 5.5% and 1.5% and euro inverter efciency of 97.5%.
4.2. Economic assumptions
The economic assessment of the PV system is performed using
the discounted cash ow method. As the rst assumption made,
only energy savings were considered, due to the fact that capacity
saving estimations are complex, and under the current Chilean
regulation PV systems do not guarantee reliable ways of decreasing
them (i.e. cloudiness during measurement of peak demand). This
indicates that the economic performance shown on this work is to
be considered a lower bound.
The cash ows stream of the economic model consider the
annual difference between the base case exercise without PV sys-
tem (Business as Usual or BAU), which only accounts for energy
purchased from the network, and the case with an installed PV
system, which considers the overnight investment cost, operational
and maintenance cost, reduced energy purchased from the
network and surplus generation energy sold back to the network. A
full equity analysis was performed, not including nancing options
in the economic analysis.
Summarized, the cash ows take into account are:
 Business as Usual Energy Purchase Cost [USD/year]
 Overnight Investment Cost [USD/Wp]
 Operational and Maintenance costs [USD/kWp-year]
 Energy Purchase Cost with Installed PV System [USD/year]
 Surplus Generated Energy Sold with Installed PV System [USD/
year]
The mathematical formulation for the Net Present Cost (NPC) of
the base and PV case and the Net Present Value (NPV) are presented
in the following equations, which use a similar methodology from
other studies [8,36]:
X
T
ECBAUt $EP
NPCBAU (2)
t1 1 rt
X
T funds for instance). Moreover, a sensitivity analysis on the discount
ECPVt $EP O&Mt  IPVt $IEP
NPCPV IC (3)
t1 1 rt
NPVPV NPCBAU  NPCPV (4)
ECPVt ECBAUt  PVGt $SCF ct21::T (5)
IPVt PVGt $1  SCF ct21::T (6)
PVGt SY$1  DR$t ct21::T (7)
Where:
 NPCBAU is the net present cost of the BAU case in [USD].
 NPCPV the net present cost of the PV case in [USD].
 NPVpv is the net present value of the PV cost relative to the BAU
case in [USD].
 ECBAUt the energy consumption from the network for the BAU
case at year t in [MWh].
337
 EP energy purchase price from the network in [USD/MWh].
 IC the overnight investment cost in [USD].
 ECPVt the energy consumption made from the network for the
PV case (by denition a lower value than ECBAUt ) at year t in
[MWh].
 O&Mt the annual cost of operation and maintenance of the PV
system for year t in [USD].
 IPVt the surplus generation from the PV system injected back to
the network in year t in MWh.
 IEPt the energy price for the energy injected to the network in
[USD/MWh].
 PVGt the annual generation of the PV system for year t in [MWh].
 SCF the self-consumption factor in % ranging from 0 to 100%.
 SY the specic yield of the PV system depending on the location
in MWh/kWp-yr.
 DR the annual linear degradation rate of the PV modules in
%/year.
 r the annual discount rate of the economic exercise in [%].
 T the evaluation period of the economic exercise in years.
To complete the economic analysis, the Internal Rate of Return
(IRR) is calculated. IRR is a widely-used parameter in the industry
for measuring the protability of potential investments, and often
is compared with a required rate of return. Its calculation consists
on determining the discount rate that makes the NPV equal to zero
[37,38]. If the IRR is equal to or greater than the required rate of
return, then the project can be considered nancially acceptable. If
it is less, the project is rejected [39].
5. Results and analysis
This section details the results of the economic exercise ob-
tained under current rate prices, regulation and irradiation condi-
tions throughout Chile. The nancial parameters for the exercise
are detailed in Table 3. The investment and operational expenses
(CAPEX and OPEX respectively) illustrate current approximate
market prices for PV systems. While the self-consumption param-
eter of 30% for residential and 90% commercial systems illustrate a
conservative scenario. The 20-year study horizon and 5% annual
discount rate were selected as referential nancial parameters,
although, they still reect the geographical differences on the
economic performance of the PV systems throughout Chile. This
discount rate it is only used as a reference for the IRR analysis,
based on the fact that for residential customers this rate is still more
attractive than a common bank investment product rate (mutual
rate was performed for the grid parity results. The overnight in-
vestment costs are based on a 2017 GIZ (German Corporation for
International Cooperation) study made in Chile [40], which ana-
lyzes the investment costs of different distributed PV systems in
Chile, specically the ones performed on public tenders made by
the Chilean Energy Ministry. Residential systems are considered
from 1 kWp to 10 kWp of installed capacity, while commercial
systems, are considered 30 kWp to 100 kWp (limited by the Net
Table 3
Large scale base case parameters [40].
Description Unit Residential Commercial
Discount Rate % 5 5
Investment Cost USD/Wp 2.5 1.5
Evaluation Period Years 20 20
O&M Costs USD/kWp-year 10 20
Degradation %/year 0.5 0.5
Self-Consumption % 30 90
338 G. Ramrez-Sagner et al. / Renewable Energy 111 (2017) 332e343

Billing Law). O&M costs are dened from experience with the
Chilean industry, as an effort to reect annual electrical inspections
and cleaning of modules, in conservative way.
5.1. Residential PV
Results for Residential PV reference case were obtained and
displayed on Fig. 4. It shows that the locations with best potential
are located at the north-center of the country, specically in the
central valley (Andacollo, Vicuna, Los Andes and San Felipe), 30 km
away from the coast. This region is characterized for having GHI
ranging from 2000 to 2300 kWh/m2-year and network tariffs from
180 to 220 USD/MWh. At northern Chile, from Arica to Vallenar, the
network electricity prices are the lowest and the only city with IRR
higher than the reference was Calama (6%), this despite having high
GHI levels (2300e2800 kWh/m2-year). For the central zone, which
goes from Santiago to Talca, the results show that IRR range from 4%
to 5.6%, with the highest values for Valparaiso and Rancagua,
achieving similar values than northern Chile. For Santiago, the main
residential consumption pole (Providencia and Lo Barnechea in the
map), presents an IRR lower than the 5.0% level for the reference
case, due to high density and efcient use of the distribution
network (lower average distribution costs). In the central-south
zone, which goes from Talca to Victoria, specically in in-land
zones and near to the big cities, the highest electricity tariffs can
be found, due to the more predominant rural and expensive dis-
tribution system. In this region, the GHI ranges from 1600 to
1900 kWh/m2-year and the IRR obtained are near to 5%. Lower IRR
values can be found at the nearby bigger cities such as Concepcion
(4%). At last, the southern region, that goes from Temuco to Puerto
Montt, a region that has GHI levels lower than 1500 kWh/m2-year
the IRRs drops to sub 4% levels.
Table 4 details the results of a sensitivity analysis of the main
districts across the Chile for different self-consumption percentages
(10% and 70%) and optimistic scenario of reduction of the PV
installed cost to 2 USD/Wp.
Under high self-consumption scenarios, the achieved IRR values
surpass the reference value on all the analyzed cities throughout
Chile, some of them even surpass the 11.0% threshold (located on
the north-central region), evidencing the potential for solar self-
consumption in Chile. For this conguration, the central-south re-
gion achieved similar IRR than the central region and higher than
the northern region, highlighting that despite the lower GHI levels
present in the central-south region of continental Chile and further
south (see Fig. 1), in scenarios with large self-consumption rates the
obtained IRR do not decrease in all cities. Illustrating the impact
that the retail price has on the economic exercise. For low self-
consumption (10%) scenarios, the IRR only surpasses the refer-
ence level of 5% for north-central region, and across the Chile the
IRR reaches values between 1 and 4%. This evidence that low self-
consumption scenarios do not gives enough incentives to invest.
When the installed cost of a PV system is decreased to 2 USD/
Wp, it can be seen that for the reference case the achieved IRR
values surpass the reference value for almost all Chile (with the
exception of the southern region), highlighting that some districts
surpass the 10% IRR threshold. The low self-consumption scenario
denes IRRs at the north-central, central and central-south regions
similar or greater than the reference. For the larger self-
consumptions scenario, all IRR values surpass the reference value,
obtaining a minimum IRR of 8.9% for the southern region. Even

Table 4
IRR parametric results for residential PV.

Installation cost [USD/Wp] 2.5 (base case) 2

Self-Consumption/City 10% 30% 70% 10% 30% 70%

Arica 1.4% 3.3% 7.5% 3.8% 5.9% 10.7%

Iquique 1.6% 3.6% 7.9% 4.1% 6.3% 11.2%
Calama 4.1% 6.0% 10.3% 6.9% 9.0% 13.9%
Antofagasta 1.6% 3.3% 7.1% 4.1% 6.0% 10.2%
Copiapo 1.7% 3.5% 7.5% 4.2% 6.2% 10.7%
Vallenar 1.5% 3.3% 7.2% 4.0% 6.0% 10.4%
Coquimbo 1.8% 3.4% 7.0% 4.3% 6.1% 10.1%
Andacollo 5.7% 7.6% 11.8% 8.6% 10.8% 15.7%
Vicuna 5.8% 7.7% 12.0% 8.8% 11.0% 15.9%
Ovalle 3.9% 5.7% 9.7% 6.7% 8.7% 13.3%
Illapel 4.6% 6.4% 10.4% 7.4% 9.4% 14.1%
Los Andes 5.4% 7.3% 11.7% 8.3% 10.5% 15.5%
San Felipe 5.3% 7.2% 11.5% 8.2% 10.3% 15.3%
Quillota 3.5% 5.2% 9.2% 6.1% 8.1% 12.6%
Valparaiso 3.6% 5.6% 10.1% 6.3% 8.5% 13.7%
Lo Barnechea 3.0% 4.7% 8.6% 5.6% 7.5% 11.9%
Providencia 2.7% 4.1% 7.5% 5.2% 6.9% 10.6%
Rancagua 3.8% 5.4% 9.0% 6.5% 8.3% 12.4%
Talca 2.9% 4.6% 8.6% 5.5% 7.5% 11.9%
Chillan 2.8% 4.6% 8.6% 5.3% 7.4% 12.0%
Concepcion 2.5% 4.0% 7.5% 5.1% 6.8% 10.7%
Los Angeles 2.5% 4.3% 8.4% 5.1% 7.1% 11.7%
Victoria 1.5% 3.9% 9.3% 3.9% 6.7% 12.7%
Temuco 1.2% 2.9% 6.6% 3.6% 5.5% 9.7%
Valdivia 0.8% 2.5% 6.1% 3.2% 5.0% 9.1%
Osorno 0.6% 2.2% 5.9% 2.9% 4.8% 8.9%
Puerto Montt 0.0% 2.0% 6.2% 2.3% 4.4% 9.2%
Fig. 4. Spatial IRR distribution for residential PV base case.
 G. Ramrez-Sagner et al. / Renewable Energy 111 (2017) 332e343 339

more, almost all locations reach a minimum IRR of 10%, with Table 5
maximum values of 16%. This evidence shows that decreasing PV Commercial PV IRR parametric results for different initial investment cost.

system installation costs increase the feasibility for PV installation City Initial investment cost USD/Wp
for all continental Chile, including the southern regions. 1.5 1.3 1.0

Arica 6.4% 8.3% 12.3%

5.2. Commercial PV Iquique 6.8% 8.7% 12.7%
Calama 10.4% 12.7% 17.5%
Results for Commercial PV reference case were obtained and Antofagasta 6.9% 8.9% 13.0%
Copiapo 7.0% 9.0% 13.1%
displayed on Fig. 5. It shows that for almost all location of Chile the
Vallenar 6.7% 8.7% 12.7%
IRR surpasses the reference value. It can be seen that the greater Coquimbo 7.3% 9.3% 13.5%
IRRs are located in the north-central region, at 30 km or more from Andacollo 12.7% 15.2% 20.7%
the coast. However, the central region reaches IRR values near to Vicuna 12.9% 15.5% 21.0%
Ovalle 10.2% 12.5% 17.3%
10% IRR. At the northern Chile, present sub 10%, except for Calama
Illapel 11.1% 13.5% 18.5%
that is far from the coast and presents better radiation conditions. Los Andes 12.3% 14.7% 20.0%
The central-south region has a gradual and stable performance of San Felipe 12.1% 14.5% 19.8%
its IRR which behaves as a function of the GHI. In these results the Quillota 9.5% 11.7% 16.4%
northern region obtains a similar behavior as the central-south Valparaiso 9.5% 11.8% 16.4%
Lo Barnechea 9.0% 11.1% 15.6%
region due to the difference on the electricity prices. The south-
Providencia 8.7% 10.8% 15.3%
ern region has the same IRR decreasing which are a function of the Rancagua 10.1% 12.4% 17.2%
GHI, achieving a 4% IRR near Puerto Montt. Talca 8.7% 10.8% 15.3%
Table 5 reported a sensitivity analysis varying the installed cost Chillan 8.4% 10.5% 14.9%
Concepcion 8.4% 10.5% 14.9%
of the PV system from 1.5 to 1 USD/Wp. Its details how for a con-
Los Angeles 8.1% 10.2% 14.6%
servative base case of investment costs several cities throughout Victoria 5.7% 7.5% 11.4%
Chile achieve an IRR larger than 10%. These cities are located in the Temuco 6.4% 8.3% 12.2%
central-north region. Large consumption poles, such as the Valdivia 5.6% 7.4% 11.2%
Osorno 5.2% 7.0% 10.7%
Puerto Montt 4.2% 5.9% 9.4%

Metropolitan Region (Lo Barnechea and Providencia) present sub

10% IRR. Northern region present sub 10% IRR except for the city of
Calama, which is located distant from the coast. Cities located in the
central-south region present IRR ranging from 7% to 10%, indicating
potential for further development and an increase in the pool of
potential clients.
When decreasing the PV investment cost from 1.5 to 1.3 USD/
Wp, several cities from the central-north region to the central-
south (ranging from Andacollo to Los Angeles) achieve 10% IRR or
higher. Only central-north cities located in inner valleys, far from
the coast, achieve values over 15% IRR. When investment costs of
1.0 USD/Wp are achieved, virtually the entire analyzed geography
achieves IRRs over 10%. Central Chile achieves 15% IRRs and higher
~ a, San Felipe and
and cities in inner valleys such as Andacollo, Vicun
Los Andes, achieve 20% IRR or higher.

5.3. Result analysis

Several correlations can be analyzed from the presented results.

Fig. 5. Spatial IRR [%] distribution for commercial PV base case.
One of them was the relation between the IRR versus the specic
yield for all locations. Fig. 6 show the curves for the base case
scenario of residential PV. It can be seen that the scattered point
follows a trend, that is clearer when is separated in different retail
electricity price bands. In this case, it is possible to identify 4 re-
gions. The rst region goes from 140 to 180 USD/MWh (blue color),
the second from 180 to 230 USD/MWh (red color), the third from
230 to 260 USD/MWh (green color) and the last from 260 to 290
USD/MWh (purple color). Every retail electricity price region in-
creases with different slopes, being the rst region the one that has
a lower slope. The other three regions have similar slopes (with
difference no larger than 6%) and increase the IRR 27% more than
the rst region with the increase of the specic yield.
For a larger self-consumption rate of 70%, the four regions were
more clearly distributed (see Fig. 7). The four clusters show the IRR
performance as a function of specic yield for every retail
340 G. Ramrez-Sagner et al. / Renewable Energy 111 (2017) 332e343

8%

7%

6%

5%

4%
IRR [%]

3%

2%
140-180 USD/MWh
1% 180-230 USD/MWh

0% 230-260 USD/MWh
260-290 USD/MWh
-1%
1000 1100 1200 1300 1400 1500 1600 1700 1800 1900 2000 2100 2200 2300
Specific yield [kWh/kWp]

Fig. 6. PV residential IRR vs Specic Yield distributed for different retail electricity prices and 30% of self-consumption.

Fig. 7. PV residential IRR vs Specic Yield distributed for different retail electricity prices and 70% of self-consumption.

14%
13%
12%
11%
10%
9%
IRR [%]

8%
7%
6%
5%
4%
70-100 USD/MWh
3%
100-120 USD/MWh
2%
120-140 USD/MWh
1%
1000 1100 1200 1300 1400 1500 1600 1700 1800 1900 2000 2100 2200 2300
Specific yield [kWh/kW]

Fig. 8. Commercial PV IRR vs Specic Yield scattered for different retail electricity prices.
 G. Ramrez-Sagner et al. / Renewable Energy 111 (2017) 332e343
Fig. 9. Residential Grid Parity Index distribution for 30% self-consumption and LCOE [USD/MWh].
electricity price. Every cluster increases its IRR with different
slopes; where the second cluster (red color) slope is 11% larger than
the rst region (blue color), the third 27% and the fourth 51%. If the
slopes of Figs. 6 and 7 are compared, it can be seen that the slopes
increase when the self-consumption index is increased. The in-
crease of slope for each cluster respect the base case was: 33%, 11%,
32% and 46% for the rst, second, third and fourth cluster respec-
tively. It can be seen that for higher electricity tariffs the gradient of
the clusters increases more with larger self-consumption rates,
having as a result that places with higher electricity tariffs see more
benets from self-consumption. Also, places that are in the clusters
of higher electricity tariff, will have more benet if they increase
their specic yield, allowing that possibility to maximize the per-
formance of the PV installation to increase its protability.
The same analysis was performed for commercial PV. The results
are shown in Fig. 8. For this case, 3 clusters of electricity tariffs were
found, ranging from 70 to 100 USD/MWh the rst cluster (blue
color), from 100 to 120 USD/MWh the second cluster (red color)
and from 120 to 140 USD/MWh the third cluster (green color). It can
be seen that the gradient of each cluster is different, and directly in
proportion with the tariff value. Specically, the second cluster
slope is 4.7% greater than the rst cluster, and the third cluster is
29.4% greater than the rst. For this comparison, it is shown that
the retail price can have a higher impact on the IRR than the specic
yield.
5.4. Grid parity analysis
Another method for understanding the economic performance
of photovoltaic systems is to calculate its LCOE and compare it with
the regulated end user tariff value. This cost comparison concept is
called Grid Parity. When calculating the ratio between the network
tariff and the LCOE, a value over unity would indicate potential for
developing residential systems. This simple index does not
consider the difference in the self-consumption levels, thus it is
Fig. 10. Residential Grid Parity Index distribution for 50% self-consumption and LCOE [USD/MWh].
341
necessary to adjust it. To do so, a convex weighted average factor is
proposed, which takes into consideration the complete retail tariff,
the value at which the surplus energy is injected at the grid and the
self-consumption value, obtaining the following equations:
EPk $ SCF 1  SCF$ IEPk
GPIk (8)
LCOEk
Where
 GPIk is the Grid Parity Index for location k.
 EPk the energy price for end consumers for location k.
 LCOEk the levelized cost of electricity calculated for the system in
location k.
 SCF the self-consumption factor in percentage.
 IEPk the price of the injected energy back to the network.
Fig. 9 illustrates the distribution of the grid parity index for the
314 districts in Chile for the residential base-case, for which 111
obtained a value larger than one, indicating that for 35.4% of the
Chilean districts it would make economic sense to install residen-
tial PV systems as a complement to network electricity
consumption.
When increasing the self-consumption index from 30 to 50%,
the number of districts with a grid parity index larger than unity is
268 (85.4% of the districts) for the base case, indicating the weight
that this variable has on the economic outcome (see Fig. 10). It is
also worth mentioning that not only the locations with low LCOE
have high grid parity indices, indicating the importance of under-
standing the impact that the current regulated tariff values and the
solar resource have on the nancial outcome of a residential PV
exercise.
Both, Figs. 9 and 10 detail the sensitivity analysis of the discount
rate parameter. Both gures show how an increase or decrease in
the value of the discount rate can respectively decrease and
342 G. Ramrez-Sagner et al. / Renewable Energy 111 (2017) 332e343
Fig. 11. Commercial Grid Parity Index distribution for 90% self-consumption and LCOE [USD/MWh].
increase the amount of districts that present a grid parity index
above unity. Both Figs. 9 and 10, also detail the importance of
system sizing, which impacts the self-consumption parameter.
For commercial systems under the base-case, 275 districts
(87.6%) present a grid parity index larger than unity, indicating a
large potential for developing this segment of the PV market po-
tential (see Fig. 11). Increasing the discount rate of the commercial
exercise yields in decreasing the number of districts with grid
parity index larger than unity. Specically, from 275 to 205 for an
annual discount rate of 7% and 58 for 9%. Considering that a typical
commercial PV system would most likely have a large self-
consumption parameter of design, lowering the perceived nan-
cial risk of the installation and operation of a distributed com-
mercial PV system would yield in a larger number of districts with a
grid parity index larger than unity.
6. Discussion
Chile has been one of the most interesting study cases in terms
of renewable energy deployment. Mainly due to the presence of a
power market without direct incentives (PPAs for specic hours of
the day) and with a regulatory framework that mandates a mini-
mum amount of contracted energy to be supplied from renewables.
This constraint that has not been active and it is foreseen to stay like
that for the next 5 years due to large increase of renewable market
share during the last years. This scenario, arose the question of
where and what kind of PV to deploy: low LCOE large-scale plants
located far north together with transmission infrastructure or
distributed smaller scale PV plants or systems (residential) closer to
the consumption poles?
The market has resolved, in what we call the rst stage of PV
deployment in Chile, to develop large-scale PV plants but without
improving the transmission infrastructure. This is due to the
different development times that each kind of projects has (1e2
years relative to 7e8 years). Given the situation, this work takes
interest in discovering the potential of the latter option of
deployment, the distributed PV. The results were obtained using up
to date parameters and tools, such as GIS maps. These results are
within the range of previous studies in Chile, in terms of economic
performance, specically IRR [25] and potential [37]. The infor-
mation generated in this study helps understanding the possible
balance between large-scale and distributed PV in Chile, but further
work must be considered to improve input knowledge for decision
makers/investors/developers, such as the following:
 No soiling energy losses were added to the exercise (considered
in the O&M costs), an issue that is site-specic and that has been
recently been studied in the country [41].
 Self-consumption is a key parameter that must be further on
studied; in our work, it was parameterized. Regulatory changes
can yield in different market value for distributed solar energy
ending with a sub-utilized or stranded asset, thus it must also be
considered.
 Finally, the opportunity cost of installing distributed PV must be
further on studied as an effort to understand which prole of
investor would be interested in the prole of cash-ows that
behind the meter PV presents. This must be addressed in
accordance with different nancing options.
7. Conclusions
In this study an economic analysis for residential and com-
mercial PV systems was performed to survey their feasibility in
Chile. The study aims to highlight the PV system potential in all the
country in the residential and commercial sector, leaving behind
the statement that the development of these systems can only be
performed in places of very high solar irradiation. The analysis was
extended for 314 districts of Chile. The actual regulatory framework
was applied, which consist in a Net-Billing scheme and two
different tariff structure (LV1 for residential and HV4 for commer-
cial systems). The electricity tariff from the DNOs were gathered for
all the studied districts, and a weighted average electricity tariff
was calculated, relative to the number of costumers that each DNO
has in its concession area.
Economic performance results for both systems were obtained
and presented in GIS maps. The results show that almost all Chile
exhibits a great potential, particularly in the commercial sector. Res-
idential PV system shows that more protability is obtained for larger
self-consumptions rates. This demonstrates the potential existence
for self-consumption in Chile. This can push public policy incentives
for distributed energy resources, such as educational campaigns for
understanding the self-consumption potential. Also, the liberalization
of the consumption metered information can be achieved, which
works as an improvement for a better data exchange to the end user.
The results show that decreasing PV system installation costs in-
creases the feasibility for PV installations, allowing for grid parity
almost throughout the entire continental Chile. This is considering
already existing PV system prices such as the ones that Germany ex-
hibits (below 2 USD/Wp for residential systems). It is expected that by
means of simulated competition (tenders) the prices will further drop,
a phenomenon that also happened in Germany, which achieved
below 2 USD/Wp installation prices of PV systems by the imple-
mentation of Feed-In-Tariff schemes.
In the commercial sector, the results show that for almost all
districts of Chile the IRR surpasses the reference value, evidencing
the potential. These IRRs achieved maximum values of 11% for the
 G. Ramrez-Sagner et al. / Renewable Energy 111 (2017) 332e343
base case (90% self-consumption). Also, with lower PV installation
costs the protability increases for all districts of the country
achieving a minimum protability of 10% in all the country. These
ndings highlight the importance of the track-record building
effort made by the Energy Ministry, which seeks to foster an in-
dustry (competition, professionalization and price discovery) but
also to demonstrate an already world-wide proven concept
(decrease perceived risk) which is roof mounted PV.
Herein it was found that districts can be clustered by the elec-
tricity tariff, obtaining IRRs that have a relation with the specic
yield, which can be simplied to a linear function. For each cluster
of electricity tariff, the slope of IRR per specic yield increases more
with higher electricity tariff and larger self-consumption rates. This
means that higher electricity tariff clusters see more benet from
self-consumption than low tariff clusters, allowing for new op-
portunities for maximizing the performance of PV installations.
Finally, it was shown that grid parity is achieved in 35% and 88% of
the districts in Chile for residential and commercial respectively
under the base case.
This study is of primordial importance for the development of
renewable energies in the region, giving further understanding on
the economic feasibility of the photovoltaic technology for self-
consumption. With the current conditions in Chile, the PV tech-
nology in the residential and commercial sectors have a huge po-
tential. The ndings of this analysis give signals of the actual market
opportunities for the policy-makers and the PV industry of the
country.
Acknowledgments
The authors gratefully acknowledge the technical support pro-
vided by Solargis, for contributing with valuable data to the article.
They also acknowledge the partial nancial support of CORFO
project 13CEI2-21803.
References
[1] Paris, REN21, Renewables 2016 Global Status Report, 2016.
[2] S. Rodrigues, R. Torabikalaki, F. Faria, N. Cafofo, X. Chen, A.R. Ivaki, et al.,
Economic feasibility analysis of small scale PV systems in different countries,
Sol. Energy 131 (2016) 81e95, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/
j.solener.2016.02.019.
[3] R. Fu, T.L. James, D. Chung, D. Gagne, A. Lopez, A. Dobos, Economic competi-
tiveness of U.S. utility-scale photovoltaics systems in 2015: regional cost
modeling of installed cost ($/W) and LCOE ($/kWh), in: 2015 IEEE 42nd
Photovolt. Spec. Conf. PVSC, 2015, http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/
PVSC.2015.7356261, 2015.
[4] R. Fu, D. Chung, T. Lowder, D. Feldman, K. Ardani, R. Margolis, U. S. Solar
Photovoltaic System Cost Benchmark, Q1 2016, 2016.
s, A. Pino, M. Salgado, E.B. Pereira, F.R. Martins, et al.,
[5] R.A. Escobar, C. Corte
Estimating the potential for solar energy utilization in Chile by satellite-
derived data and ground station measurements, Sol. Energy 121 (2015)
139e151, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.solener.2015.08.034.
[6] R.A. Escobar, C. Corte s, A. Pino, E.B. Pereira, F.R. Martins, J.M. Cardemil, Solar
energy resource assessment in Chile: satellite estimation and ground station
measurements, Renew. Energy 71 (2014) 324e332, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/
j.renene.2014.05.013.
[7] CIFES, Reporte CIFES: Energas Renovables en el Mercado Ele ctrico Chileno -
Julio, 2016, 2016.
[8] R. Dufo-Lo pez, J.L. Bernal-Agustn, A comparative assessment of net metering
and net billing policies. Study cases for Spain, Energy 84 (2015) 684e694,
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.energy.2015.03.031.
[9] J. Thakur, B. Chakraborty, Sustainable net metering model for diversied India,
Energy Procedia 88 (2016) 336e340, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/
j.egypro.2016.06.139.
[10] A. Poullikkas, A comparative assessment of net metering and feed in tariff
schemes for residential PV systems, Sustain. Energy Technol. Assess. 3 (2013)
1e8, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.seta.2013.04.001.
[11] Biblioteca del Congreso Nacional de Chile, Ley No. 20571, 2012. https://www.
leychile.cl/N?i1038211&f2012-03-22&p.
[12] E. Tarigan, Djuwari, F.D. Kartikasari, Techno-economic simulation of a grid-
connected PV system design as specically applied to residential in
343
Surabaya, Indonesia, Energy Procedia 65 (2015) 90e99, http://dx.doi.org/
10.1016/j.egypro.2015.01.038.
[13] P.A. Fokaides, A. Kylili, Towards grid parity in insular energy systems: the case
of photovoltaics (PV) in Cyprus, Energy Policy 65 (2014) 223e228, http://
dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2013.10.045.
[14] L.A.H. Munoz, J.C.C.M. Huijben, B. Verhees, G.P.J. Verbong, The power of grid
parity: a discursive approach, Technol. Forecast. Soc. Change 87 (2014)
179e190, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.techfore.2013.12.012.
[15] C. Breyer, A. Gerlach, Global overview on grid-parity, Prog. Photovoltaics Res.
Appl. 21 (2013) 121e136, http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/pip.1254.
[16] T. Biondi, M. Moretto, Solar grid parity dynamics in Italy: a real option
approach, Energy 80 (2015) 293e302, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/
j.energy.2014.11.072.
[17] D. Voivontas, G. Tsiligiridis, D. Assimacopoulos, Solar potential for water
heating explored by GIS, Sol. Energy 62 (1998) 419e427, http://dx.doi.org/
10.1016/S0038-092X(98)00027-9.
[18] Solargis, Solargis - iMaps, (n.d.). http://solargis.info.
[19] T. Cebecauer, M. Suri, Site-adaptation of satellite-based DNI and GHI time
series; overview and SolarGIS approach, in: SolarPACES 2015, 2015, http://
dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.4949234.
[20] E.B. Pereira, F.R. Martins, S.L. de Abreu, R. Rther, Atlas Brasileiro de Energia
Solar, Sa~o Jose dos Campos, 2006.
[21] F.R. Martins, E.B. Pereira, S.L. Abreu, Satellite-derived Solar Resource Maps for
Brazil under SWERA Project, vol. 81, 2007, pp. 517e528, http://dx.doi.org/
10.1016/j.solener.2006.07.009.
[22] F.R. Martins, E.B. Pereira, S.A.B. Silva, S.L. Abreu, S. Colle, Solar energy scenarios
in Brazil, Part one, Resour. Assess. 36 (2008) 2853e2864, http://dx.doi.org/
10.1016/j.enpol.2008.02.014.
[23] R.A. Escobar, C. Corte s, A. Pino, A. Ortega, J.M. Cardemil, Atlas Solar de Chile,
Santiago de Chile, 2013.
[24] P. Campos, L. Troncoso, P.D. Lund, C. Cuevas, A. Fissore, R. Garcia, Potential of
distributed photovoltaics in urban Chile, Sol. Energy 135 (2016) 43e49, http://
dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.solener.2016.05.043.
[25] D. Watts, M.F. Valde s, D. Jara, A. Watson, Potential residential PV development
in Chile: the effect of Net Metering and Net Billing schemes for grid-connected
PV systems, Renew. Sustain. Energy Rev. 41 (2015) 1037e1051, http://
dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2014.07.201.
[26] CNE, Electricidad - Comisio n Nacional de Energa, (n.d.). https://www.cne.cl/
estadisticas/electricidad/ (Accessed 15 October 2016).
[27] M. Hanel, R. Escobar, Inuence of solar energy resource assessment uncer-
tainty in the levelized electricity cost of concentrated solar power plants in
Chile, Renew. Energy 49 (2013) 96e100, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/
j.renene.2012.01.056.
[28] Massachusetts Institute of Technology, The Future of Solar Energy, MIT, 2015.
[29] S.B. Darling, F. You, A. Velosa, Environmental Science Assumptions and the
levelized cost of energy for photovoltaics, Energy Environ. Sci. 4 (2011),
http://dx.doi.org/10.1039/c0ee00698j.
[30] W. Short, D.J. Packey, T. Holt, A Manual for the Economic Evaluation of Energy
Efciency and Renewable Energy Technologies, 1995 doi:NREL/TP-462-5173.
[31] J. Hernandez-Moro, J.M. Martnez-Duart, Analytical model for solar PV and
CSP electricity costs: present LCOE values and their future evolution, Renew.
Sustain. Energy Rev. 20 (2013) 119e132, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/
j.rser.2012.11.082.
[32] K. Branker, M.J.M. Pathak, J.M. Pearce, A review of solar photovoltaic levelized
cost of electricity, Renew. Sustain. Energy Rev. 15 (2011) 4470e4482, http://
dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2011.07.104.
[33] A.G. Empresas Electricas, Documentos Licitacio n de Suministro 2015/02, 2016.
http://www.licitacioneselectricas.cl/licitaciones-anteriores/licitacion-
suministro-2015-02/documentos/ (Accessed 4 March 2017).
[34] Comisio n Nacional de Energa de Chile, La regulacio n del segmento distrib-
ucion en Chile, Santiago de Chile, 2006.
[35] Solargis, Solargis pvPlanner User Manual, n.d. http://solargis.com (Accessed
20 September 2016).
[36] Z. Ren, G. Grozev, A. Higgins, Modelling impact of PV battery systems on
energy consumption and bill savings of Australian houses under alternative
tariff structures, Renew. Energy 89 (2016) 317e330, http://dx.doi.org/
10.1016/j.renene.2015.12.021.
[37] F. Bustos, A. Toledo, J. Contreras, A. Fuentes, Sensitivity analysis of a photo-
voltaic solar plant in Chile, Renew. Energy 87 (2016) 145e153, http://
dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2015.09.070.
[38] J.E. Burns, J.S. Kang, Comparative economic analysis of supporting policies for
residential solar PV in the United States: solar Renewable Energy Credit
(SREC) potential, Energy Policy 44 (2012) 217e225, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/
j.enpol.2012.01.045.
[39] M. EL-Shimy, Viability analysis of PV power plants in Egypt, Renew. Energy 34
(2009) 2187e2196, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.renene.2009.01.010.
[40] GIZ, Indice de Precios de sistemas fotovoltaicos (FV) conectados a la red de
distribucio n comercializados en Chile, 2016. https://energypedia.info/images/
1/17/Indice_de_Precios_de_sistemas_FV_ley_de_Generacion_Distribuida.pdf.
[41] E. Urrejola, J. Antonanzas, P. Ayala, M. Salgado, G. Ramrez-Sagner, C. Corte s, et
al., Effect of soiling and sunlight exposure on the performance ratio of
photovoltaic technologies in Santiago, Chile, Energy Convers. Manag. 114
(2016) 338e347, http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.enconman.2016.02.016.