Written by Sandra Aguado
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Last Friday, April 5, 2019, the Council of Ministers approved Royal Decree 244/2019 , which regulates the administrative, technical and economic conditions of electrical self-consumption. How does this new proposal from the Ministry for the Ecological Transition affect citizens?
The decree, approved together with the Strategy against Energy Poverty, enables, among other things, the figure of collective self-consumption as a definitive push in communities of owners or industrial estates. To this end, it establishes a simplified mechanism for compensation of self-produced and unconsumed energy and reduces cumbersome administrative procedures.
Photovoltaic solar energy for homes with two new options
There are two new options for all those who wish to install solar panels in their homes.
Surplus-free option : For those who prefer not to feed the surplus energy produced by their solar panels into the grid. The procedure for this option is the simplest.
Surplus option : For those who wish to pour their surplus energy into the electrical grid and receive compensation in the form of savings for doing so.
Photovoltaic solar energy worker
If you choose the “with surplus” option and pour the energy you do not consume into the grid, your electricity bill will show a negative balance that will be subtracted from what you pay for the power term (fixed cost) lawyers email address in usa and for energy consumption (variable). This procedure is called “simplified compensation” and has as a savings limit the total energy consumed, that is, monetary payments will never be made for an energy surplus greater than consumption. In the event that you wish to sell the surplus because it is greater than production, you must register as a producer.
Which electricity supplier should you have in order to have solar photovoltaic energy for your home?
For both options, the answer is either way. However, the Decree makes a distinction between regulated suppliers, the large ones, and free market suppliers, the small ones. Even though with any of them you can have solar photovoltaic energy for your home, the savings compensation will not be the same in one as in the other. While in the large energy corporations the savings will be calculated based on the price of electricity in the wholesale market, in the small ones agreements can be reached between individuals and the company.
Photovoltaic solar energy for housing in communities of neighbors
Solar panels in building community
The shared self-consumption modality allows savings to be shared among residents of a community. This saving is called “static” and is calculated by hours.
Reduction of administrative procedures
Simplifying in order to facilitate is the key to the new Royal Decree, which is why one of its measures is the reduction of all administrative procedures .
In the case of self-consumption (installations of up to 15kW or up to 100kW, in the case of self-consumption without surplus), they will be carried out in a single procedure that will consist of the notification of the installation of an electricity production plant to the corresponding autonomous community or city. Likewise, the power of the installation will also play an important role in processing issues since installations of up to 15 kW are exempt from processing a connection point to the network with the distributed companies, while those ranging between 15 and 100kW must process it with its consequent increase in cost.
From 100kW onwards, it is not considered self-consumption, so the installation must be registered as an electricity producer.
Consequences of the new technical conditions for self-consumption of electricity
housing with solar panels
The consequences of this new reality will be doubly beneficial for the community, since, on the one hand, it encourages the use of renewable energies as an ecological measure and, on the other hand, it has an enormously positive effect on the economy in general.
To this end, it offers a series of facilities that did not exist until now, such as the possibility of self-consumption with an installation that is at a maximum distance of 500 metres from the home. In other words, it does not have to be located on the roof of the home. Or the option of collective self-consumption, which allows several consumers to benefit from a single community installation. Likewise, it offers the possibility for a consumer to take advantage of their neighbour's surplus and participate in the consumption of their energy.
On the other hand, it will not be necessary to have an extra meter to measure the energy produced, since the new decree, within its saving measures, has stipulated that a single meter must work in a bidirectional manner, measuring both production and consumption.
Everything seems to indicate that these new measures will encourage citizens to use solar photovoltaic energy in their homes as a method of saving and raising social awareness. Becoming an expert in solar photovoltaic energy has never been so beneficial given the high demand for professionals expected for 2019.