On the development of a reliability based optimal renewable energy model for the sustainable energy scene in India

Abstract

SYNOPSIS Sustainable Energy Development Planning has been the thrust area in developing countries like India. An Optimal Renewable Energy Model (OREM) with Reliability constraint which minimises the cost/efficiency ratio has been developed. The other constraints included in the model are social acceptance, resource limitation, demand and reliability factors. Thirty eight different renewable energy options are considered in the model. The OREM gives the allocation of renewable energy sources for lighting, cooking, pumping, heating, cooling and transportation end-uses for the year 2020–21 in India. For sustainable energy, the reliability of renewable energy systems have to be considered. In this paper, a detailed study has been made to analyse the reliability of a 15 kW solar photovoltaic system, which will be used in one of the constraint equations of the model. Reliability analysis reveals that there were no technical failures in the photovoltaic devices. But the power conversion accessories, such as the inverter and output contactor experienced failure rates of 1.48 × 10−4/hour and 1.67 × 10−4/hour respectively, resulting in poor reliability of the system. The reliability factor of the photovoltaic system is found to be 0.2 at 5000 hours. The fault analysis by Pareto diagram reveals that by eliminating the system component failures, the reliability factor can be improved to the factor of 0.67. As far as the solar PV is concerned, the model (OREM) selects solar PV for lighting to an extent of 0.5198 × 1015 kJ and for pumping 1.2084 × 1015 kJ.