Title: Distribution System Pricing with Distributed Energy Resources
Abstract: Technological changes in the electric utility industry bring tremendous opportunities and significant challenges. Customers are installing clean sources of on-site generation such as rooftop solar photovoltaic (PV) systems. At the same time, smart appliances and control systems that can communicate with the grid are entering the retail market. Among the opportunities these changes create are a cleaner and more diverse power system, the ability to improve system reliability and system resilience, and the potential for lower total costs. Challenges include integrating these new resources in a way that maintains system reliability, provides an equitable sharing of system costs, and avoids unbalanced impacts on different groups of customers, including those who install distributed energy resources (DERs) and low-income households who may be the least able to afford the transition.