Firm’s upgrading within the Solar Photovoltaic Energy Value Chain

Firm’s upgrading within the Solar Photovoltaic Energy Value Chain: An exploratory study in Costa Rica

Carvajal Rodriguez, Juan (TU Delft Technology, Policy and Management)

Werker, Claudia (mentor)
Kamp, Linda (graduation committee)
van Beers, Cees (graduation committee)

Delft University of Technology

2017-12-11

Costa Rica’s electric grid is dominated by renewable sources, mostly by hydropower 74% and with geothermal 12.4% and wind 10.6%. Hence, in dry season when the water levels drop significantly, there are difficulties to supply the national electricity demand (CENCE, 2016). Despite this and the added fact that the country’s has enormous solar energy potential, solar PV technology has not been diffused to act as an energy complement during dry season it merely represents 0.01% of the energy grid as outlined by Valverde, Lara, Lobo, & Rojas (2015). However, recent global and local developments have spurred the country’s demand for solar PV projects. Globally, there has been a dramatic decrease in solar PV panel’s prices causing significant cost reductions for solar PV installations (Feldman & Barbose, 2015). In Costa Rica a recent executive decree resulted in enabling and regulating the distributed energy generation model on renewable systems however only for self-sustaining purposes including that of solar PV.

value chains
knowledge management
firm’s upgrading
solar PV energy
Innovation Systems

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:c9561644-68f8-476c-834e-e23845cd023c

Student theses

master thesis

© 2017 Juan Carvajal Rodriguez