A Review of Distributed Generation for Rural and Remote Area Electrification

Distributed Generation (DG), which is electricity generation located close to the load/demand. While the definition of DG is far from “settled” [1], for the purpose of this project, DG will refer to electricity generation that is produced and consumed within the catchment area of the local Distribution Network Service Provider (DSNP). Many in the energy economics and policy literature also use the term “embedded generation”, which tends to reflect DG that has been incorporated into a larger electricity grid (but often still retains the ability to operate in isolation from the grid). Distributed power generation has been used for decades [2], and has been met with mixed success. There is a plethora of literature that examines the use of DG in developing countries [3-5], in relation to World Bank development projects [6], with respect to high penetration of DG in Australia [7-10], and for a more general discussion [5]. Furthermore, the DG literature has been growing and is now being examined in context of rural communities across different scales from household systems [11] to community mini-grids [12] and grid connected systems [13].