Abstract
This paper thoroughly considers the potential of installing microgrids (MGs) in communities that suffer from the economic crisis in order to financially stimulate their local economies. Exploiting the state-of-the-art evolutions in the fields of the MG technology, the Hybrid Techno-Economic (HTE) model is proposed as a suitable techno-economic tool for assessing the power generation/consumption behaviour and the financial performance of these communities’ MGs. The contribution of this paper is four-fold. First, the HTE model is presented. HTE model describes a theoretical analysis that is suitable for studying community’s MGs. Appropriately concatenating one well-validated technical module and one new economic module, the HTE model quickly and conveniently reveals the power generation/consumption and economic profile of community’s MGs. Second, HTE model is integrated through an extended portfolio of power and financial metrics. The applied metrics study the influence of generation and consumption power changes on community’s MGs. The validity and the efficiency of the HTE model are examined with respect to these power changes while the impact of these changes on the power and cash flows of community’s MGs are assessed. Third, a cost-benefit analysis of the operation of community’s MGs accompanied with a financial stability analysis is also demonstrated. The main outcome of these analyses is the daily total benefit (TB) of community’s MGs with its respective financial bounds. Fourth, the contribution of the energy arbitrage and the power production mix among available power sources of community’s MGs to the daily TB is investigated. Apart from promoting the ecological awareness, this paper tries to become a catching argument for the communities in order to exploit the community’s MGs. Citation: Lazaropoulos, A. G., and Lazaropoulos, P. (2015). Financially Stimulating Local Economies by Exploiting Communities’ Microgrids: Power Trading and Hybrid Techno-Economic (HTE) Model. Trends in Renewable Energy, 1(3), 131-184. DOI: 10.17737/tre.2015.1.3.0014
Highlights
This paper thoroughly considers the potential of installing microgrids (MGs) in communities that suffer from the economic crisis in order to financially stimulate their local economies
In the following simulation results, a real community’s MG is assumed during a typical day [52]. This MG consists of three main subcomponents
500kWh, the purchase costs of and are assumed equal to 600$/kWh, respectively, the interest rate r is equal to 6%, the Energy Storage Systems (ESSs) repayment period l is equal to three years and the maintenance cost of is assumed equal to 2000$
Summary
Trends in Renewable Energy, 1 communities around the world. While the severity of these problems varies from one community to another, new policies have to be adopted as well as new tools and mechanisms have to be invented, restructured, and overhauled [1]-[4]. On the basis of the small communities that decide to deploy MGs as an additional revenue to their budgets, the 24-hour technical support of this sophisticated equipment requires extra resources such as the cost of the specialized personnel that deals with the community’s MG issues and the relative decisions concerning its operation To reduce these communities’ expenses and make the idea of community’s MGs more tempting, the HTE model can be used. The goal of the HTE model is to provide an optimal mix solution among ESS/DG/RES outputs and energy market but to offer a quick and convenient model for small communities that decide to install MGs so as to create additional revenues in order to financially stimulate their local economies. On the basis of the maximization of the daily TB, the outputs of the technical module are defined through the prism of energy arbitrage and of certain technical constraints regarding the operation of community’s MGs [52]
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