Technical and Economic Aspects of Gridconnected Solar Photovoltaics in Brazil - Implementing Environmental and Resource Management - page 41

6 Technical and Economic Aspects of Grid-
connected Solar Photovoltaics in Brazil
Jordi Cadilla
EC International Aid, Cooperation Officer for Infrastructures, EU Delegation in
Kigali, Rwanda
6.1 Introduction
This first part of this chapter offers an overview of today's Brazilian energy sec-
tor, as well as a review of the government's development plan for the sector until
2030. In addition, the availability of solar resource in the country is portrayed. The
central sections are the steps and results of a case study, consisting of the design of
a grid-connected rooftop photovoltaic system for a hypothetical sports building in
South Brazil using three solar module technologies (amorphous silicon, polycrys-
talline silicon, and copper indium diselenide). Finally, conclusions are drawn con-
sidering the economic and technical feasibility of the three configurations of the
case study, the estimated environmental impacts associated with them, as derived
from reviewed studies, and the current policy context in Brazil. These technical
and economic aspects can be to some extent extrapolated to countries with similar
climate conditions and problems to overcome barriers towards a larger deploy-
ment of the photovoltaic technology. The expansion of the use of renewable ener-
gies as a tool for avoiding the depletion of non-renewable resources; the analysis
of environmental impacts as a tool for environmental protection; the study of
problems and opportunities in developing countries as part of the environmental
planning, as well as sustainability appraisals, are widely discussed within the con-
text of Environmental and Resource Management (BTU 2009).
The main goal of this study was to analyse the potential and feasibility (techni-
cal and economic) of a renewable energy technology in a developing country. The
case study was based on the solar PV (photovoltaics) directly connected to the
public grid in Brazil. Since the current plans of the Brazilian government do not
envision a significant role for the photovoltaic technology, the research question
of this chapter was to find out whether this decision has good fundament from a
technical, economic or environmental point of view. The chosen method consisted
of the performance of a technical-economic study for a specific grid-connected PV
facility in the Brazilian state with the lowest available solar irradiation (Santa Ca-
tarina). To provide context and background, a review of the main features of the
country's energy sector, the assessment of the country's potential for PV deploy-