Renewable energy policy for British Virgin Islands
Feasibility studies and conceptual design of wind farm and solar projects on small grids.
Customer
British Virgin Islands Electricity Corporation (BVIEC)
BVIEC serves over 15,000 customers and posesses diesel fired generators which have an installed capacity of approximately 44 MW. The major functions of BVIEC are the generation, transmission, supply, distribution and sale of electricity throughout the British Virgin Islands.
Customer challenge
BVIEC is developing a renewable energy strategy based on wind and solar energy in order to be less dependent on fossil fueled power generation in the future. The challenge is that the renewable energy sources have to feed into relative small grids.
Our services
DNV work activities notably include:
- Feasibility studies for the potential for development of approximately 8 MW in total of wind, solar, and waste-to-energy and waste heat projects
- Project site selections for developing renewable projects
- Conceptual design, including wind turbine technology selection and wind farm layout optimization
- Fuel cost savings estimations to complete the financial feasibility assessment
- Small grid studies: transmission renewable study including transmission impact and power simulation assessments (dynamic and steady-state)
- Production costing study: reviewing the kWh purchase cost for energy on the island, understanding the actual generation cost rate and suggesting the minimum rate for generation by independent power producers and smaller users via a feed-in tariff
- Distributed solar PV study
- Review of the current legislation policy in the British Virgin Islands and made recommendations on how to revise legislation to allow for generation of electricity by entities other than the island’s utility
- Developing an energy policy for the British Virgin Islands which has been approved by government.