PERFORMANCE EVALUATION OF A 67.2 KWP SI-POLY PHOTOVOLTAIC SYSTEM CONNECTED TO THE GRID USING PVSYST TOOL

Abstract

This paper presents the simulated performance evaluation of a 67.2 kWp grid-connected Si-poly photovoltaic system. This study was carried out to assess the feasibility of installing a photovoltaic system to supply the electrical loads at the Alioune DIOP University of Bambey, Senegal, a public institution. Indeed, the UADB is facing load shedding problems caused by its exorbitant energy consumption. The study system comprises 240 Si-poly modules. Each module has a rated output of 280 Wp. All photovoltaic modules are connected in 12 strings, each string consisting of 20 modules in series. Three solar inverters, each rated at 20 kW, are used for interconnection with the grid via a public meter. For the case study, PVsyst 7.4 is used for simulation. PVsyst 7.4 is a PC software package for the design, dimensioning and data analysis of complete photovoltaic systems. Meteonorm 8.1 meteorological data sets on solar radiation, ambient temperature, wind speed and humidity from the PVsyst database were used for this analysis. In this study, the parameters evaluated were the photovoltaic arrays effective energy production, the energy injected into the grid, the performance rate and the normalized energy production per kWp installed. The 67.2 kWp photovoltaic system generates 111.287 MWh/year of DC energy, of which 108.980 MWh/year of AC energy is fed into the grid. The systems annual performance rate is around 81.5%, and the loss diagram over the whole year is also computed.