Abstract
Zambia is today 90% hydropower dependent, but this may change because Zambia and the World at large are today facing a changing climate that affects the ecosystem, rain patterns, and spurs drought which reduces the production of hydropower. The current power deficit experienced in Zambia points to a need to deploy a renewable energy generation-mix strategy. This study conducts a solar photovoltaic performance and financial analysis for grid-connected homes in Zambia to investigate the role of solar energy as an enabler for energy security in Zambia using the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) System Advisor Model (SAM) simulation method. It further reviews the available solar irradiance, modeling a detailed grid-connected photovoltaic system using locally available products for a single owner in a power purchase agreement (PPA) with the Zambia Electricity Company Limited (ZESCO). This model would alleviate the current power load shedding experienced by the residential sector, of up to 22 hours of no electricity out of 24 hours in a day. Alongside the technical performance model and an unfavorable business climate in Zambia, a financial model is also developed to help assess project feasibility and financial viability. A 1 kW solar PV system was modeled at an installation cost of US$1.27 per watt on a short-term basis of 5 years and found that the project is feasible with a 28.52% IRR achieved in 3 years and a 69% performance ratio and a debt service coverage ratio (DSCR) of 5.12 by the end of the project life, thereby indicating capability to turn around Zambia’s energy poverty to meet the UN SDG 7.
Highlights
Zambia is a hydrodependent country but is currently facing a massive power load shedding that is a result of drought during the 2018/2019 rainy season
The solar photovoltaic performance and financial modeling solution for grid-connected homes in Zambia is a feasible and viable solution that is capable of reducing the unacceptable and prolonged load shedding hours from the current 20 hours by less than half or completely gotten rid of to provide electricity to the poor majority and small business owners who depend on electricity and cannot afford diesel power as an alternative to hydropower because of the high levelized cost of electricity (LCOE) diesel in Zambia of about US$1.29/kWh compared to a solar option with a nominal LCOE US$69.72 c/kWh
The financial metrics all indicate that solar PV project for grid-connected homes in Zambia with a capacity factor of providing 12.3% of electricity throughout the year yields the 98.13% expected energy of 1093.47 kWh/kW, thereby making the PV system, very good, feasible, and viable system concerning performance with a rating of 69%
Summary
Zambia is a hydrodependent country but is currently facing a massive power load shedding that is a result of drought during the 2018/2019 rainy season. In the 21st century, the use of renewable resources like wind and solar has been propagated by the spectre of climate change and its associated impact like drought This ramp in the use of renewable resources like solar has been further exacerbated by the decline of the cost of photovoltaic modules and associated components like inverters and batteries which have made the installation cost and levelized cost of photovoltaic systems relatively low in many countries. This has further led to reduced electricity bills on the customer end especially with of feed-in tariff strategy [2, 3]. The concepts of microgrid have led to developing distributed generation (DG) systems where a self-generation unit can be connected to the national utility grid [3, 6, 7]
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