Grid Extension Cost

[BenWinchester]

Issue

The electric grid (and potentially mains-water, gas/hydrogen etc.) is included if the user specifies that the community has a grid connection, but there is no provision for a cost of extending the grid to the community as a potential alternative to relying solely on minigrid-only supply. Including this functionality is mentioned within Version 1 of the User Guide for CLOVER 4.

Proposal

Including a grid-extension cost would be an enhancement to CLOVER.

[BenWinchester]

General thoughts

@hamishbeath , I think that this is something that it would still be nice to have. CLOVER could, run an optimisation, and, as part of it, run a simulation with a grid being connected and the cost of grid extension included. This might be overlapping with the GIS work, but it might be nice if, at the end of an optimisation, a user was informed: "The best system would be 5 kWp of PV, 2 kWh of storage, with an LCUE of 1.00 $/kWh. However, extending the grid would provide electricity at an LCUE of 0.85 $/kWh and should be considered as an alternative to an off-grid system" or something similar? 😸