An Assessment of Transmission and Distribution Grid Efficiency in Turkey with Projections to 2023

Although energy consumptions of countries can be considered as one of the basic indicators showing their development levels, having high level of electric power transmission and distribution (t&d) losses means serious problems exist both technically and non-technically in their power grids. turkey’s gross electricity consumption reached 278.3 billion kwh in 2016 and electricity demand is projected to increase 367.9 billion kwh in low-demand scenario or 407.9 billion kwh in high-demand scenario by 2023. however, t&d losses in turkish electricity grid were 14.2% in 2015 which was more than twofold of oecd average. this paper provides an overview of the t&d losses in turkey, highlights the growing role of the distributed generation and smart meters and prioritize distribution regions where smart meters can be implemented. the paper finds that t&d losses can be decreased from current level to 12.38% in 2023 by investing nearly 2.2 billion dollars. though reaching oecd level is very difficult task to achieve and apparently turkey won’t get oecd level before 2030, increasing the penetration of distributed generation and implementation of smart meters to decrease technical and non-technical losses can be the key solutions for increasing energy efficiency in the turkish power grid.