Report - Renewables Support Schemes and Grid Integration Policies

On the January 23, 2008 the European Commission agreed on a far-reaching package of proposals that will deliver the European Council's commitments to fight climate change and promote RE. With the publication of this Climate Action Plan and its several targets, the EU wants to show global leadership in this area.

This report provides an overview of the Kyoto-targets and the objectives of energy from RES in final energy consumption in 2020.

As several incentive schemes exist, countries are using a variety of them. The majority of the Member States (MSs) have opted for feed-in tariff regimes as the main support mechanism, whereas a handful of MSs have opted for quota regimes. Striving to adopt best practice or otherwise optimize the efficiency of the system, countries are sometimes adapting their support mechanism. This report analyzes the primary renewable electricity support systems are elaborated on. These are: Feed-in-Tariff, Quotas Tendering/bidding, Fiscal and Financial Incentives and Tradable Green Certificates. The majority of MSs are not using a single one system, but a combination. Research has shown that there is not a system which is better than the others but that key success factors can be identified which are a requirement for any support scheme to be successful. Finally, it can be concluded that nearly every EU-country is setting up its own system.

This report also assesses the approaches of four leading countries : Germany, Spain, UK and the Netherlands. Lessons are drawn from their experiences.

Finally Distributed Generation is discussed. The latest evolutions on grid development policies and grid integration of RES in the same four countries are being provided. It is concluded that there is a lot happening on grid improvements within Europe. In the latest World Energy Outlook 2008 it becomes clear that the energy sector will have to play the central role in tackling climate change. Additionally, massive investments in energy infrastructure will be needed. What can be concluded from the analysis of the four countries is that every country found its own solution for increased RES feeding into the grid system. In Germany three of the four TSOs agreed to work more closely together regarding the grid balancing. In Spain they introduced a novel Control Centre for RE, to monitor and control these RES. The UK introduced two DG incentive schemes (IFI and RPZ) and the Netherlands introduces a Working Group Decentralized Infrastructure.