Determination of Photovoltaic Hosting Capacity on Radial Electric Distribution Feeders

The amount of photovoltaic (PV) generation that can be hosted by existing radial distribution feeders is inherently limited by system constraints and operating conditions. This paper discusses an analysis to determine the photovoltaic hosting capacity of an existing radial distribution feeder. This analysis also visualizes the location-dependence of hosting capacity, and tests the effectiveness of modifying inverter power factor on hosting capacity. The analysis was performed using python scripts to run a large number of power flow simulations in OpenDSS with successively increasing amounts of PV generation. Results indicated that when PV generation is installed in proportion to load, circuit hosting capacity is overwhelmingly limited by overvoltage conditions. Also, modifying inverters to generate at a fixed, slightly lagging power factor can effectively reduce overvoltage condition and increase the feeder hosting capacity.