Comparative techno-economic assessment and minimization of the levelized cost of electricity for increasing capacity wind power plants by row and angle layout optimization

Abstract

This work presents techno-economic assessment and optimization results for wind power implementation. The results constitute an attempt to provide recommendations on optimal design configurations and operating conditions for future possibilities of installations in Kuwait, where the wind speed is at maximum levels at high altitudes during the early daytime and late nighttime, whereas in the afternoon, the wind speed reaches its maximum at low altitudes. This cyclic behavior indicates that the wind speed and direction change in a predictable pattern, benefiting wind power generation. The techno-economic assessment and optimization are performed for multi-row design configurations of power plants. The selection using an optimal method comes through evaluating 2220 configurations, from which 60 optimal configurations are determined for different variations of the number of rows in the wind power plant (Nr) based on the minimization criterion of the Levelized Cost of Electricity (LCOE). The optimal configurations have optimal wind power plant layout angle (θplant). Some of the main findings are as follows:(i) the Nr and θplant values impact the LCOE, wake losses, performance ratio, capacity factor, and annual gross energy. (ii) The wind power density is calculated to be 289 W/m2, (iii) June and July have high levels of generation, wind speed, temperature, and humidity, (iv) there exists an exponential relation between the installed cost per watt and Nr. (v) The present value of annual energy, net present value (annual costs), annual energy, and annual gross energy have increasing linear trends as Nr increases, and (vi) the optimal configurations require a power purchase agreement price of at least 7.03 cent/kWh to make a positive return on investment.