Techno-economic analysis of a university’s electrical energy consumption with hybrid systems

Abstract

Energy demand is rising in a consequence of increasing population day by day in Turkey as in the whole world. On the other side, traditional sources are not sufficient to meet this energy need. In this context, Turkey is dependent on foreign energy sources. Renewable Energy Sources (RESs) are seen as an option in the sense of being sustainability, clean and environmentally sensitive to come from above this dependence. In this connection, in this paper, the state of providing a university’s electrical energy needs with hybrid systems (HSs) has been investigated creating 4 different scenarios. Whether the energy requirement of the selected pilot region can be provided optimally with (HSs) regarding 4 different scenarios was analyzed by using The HOMER program. When the results are examined, the optimum result is scenario 4 with the lowest the initial cost is 67,000$. The optimum systems consists of 25 kW PV module and a grid. The net present cost (NPC) of this system is 28,273,000$. To the best of the authors’ knowledge, The issue that renewable energy sources were meet the energy needs of Universities in Turkey has not been investigated previously using HOMER program. In this context, a techno-economic analyses was conducted the case that renewable energy sources can be met the energy needs of Atatürk University which is one of Turkey’s oldest and largest techno-economic analysis was made of the situation. It is aimed to contribute to the literature in this respect.