Slovenia has set aside €16 million ($16. 7 million) to support solar energy communities, requiring projects to include at least 100 kW of PV capacity, with or without storage.
Slovenia offers great potential for exploiting photovoltaic energy due to evenly spread solar irradiation. The first photovoltaic power plant in Slovenia was set up in 2001. At the end of 2017, 4,231 photovoltaic power plants had been installed in Slovenia with a total power of 267 MW.
Anarticle byLacko, R. etal. (2014) evaluates the technical feasibility of an off-grid system consisting of solar PV, wind power and hydrogen storage in Slovenia. Their results show that it is a technically feasible optionbutthattheelectricitycostinsuchasystemishighcomparedtotheprice ofelectricityfromthegrid.
ThemodellingresultsshowthatthecombinationofsolarPV,batteries,ahydrogen system and a heat pump provides a technically feasible solution for being off-grid inGothenburg. Boththebatteryandthehydrogensystemareneededtohaveboth shorttermandlongtermstorage.
Other studies have analysed different system configurations to fulfill the energy demand inan off-grid system. Anarticle byLacko, R. etal. (2014) evaluates the technical feasibility of an off-grid system consisting of solar PV, wind power and hydrogen storage in Slovenia.
In order to manage the construction and installation costs of the photovoltaic power plant, investors may apply for favourable loans or grants from the Eco Fund, the Slovenian Environmental Public Fund. Project loans for photovoltaic power plants are also available from commercial banks, usually under less favourable terms and conditions.
Another way to reduce the losses could be to use a hybrid inverter that only converts a part of the electricity from the PV system to coverthedemandofthebuilding. Thedownsideofthisisthatthehybridinverters normallycostmorethantheregularones.