Wind Power Economic Feasibility under Uncertainty and the Application of ANN in Sensitivity Analysis

Paulo Rotela Junior,Eugenio Fischetti,Liviam S Lacerda,Victor G Araújo,Rogério S Peruchi,Luiz Célio S Rocha,Giancarlo Aquila

doi:10.3390/en12122281

Abstract

Wind power has grown popular in past recent years due to environmental issues and the search for alternative energy sources. Thus, the viability for wind power generation projects must be studied in order to attend to the environmental concerns and still be attractive and profitable. Therefore, this article aims to perform a sensitive analysis in order to identify the variables that influence most in the viability of a wind power investment for small size companies in the Brazilian northeast. For this, a stochastic analysis of viability through Monte Carlo Simulation (MCS) will be made and afterwards, Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) models will be applied for the most relevant variables identification. Through the sensitivity, it appears that the most relevant factors in the analysis are the speed of wind, energy tariff and the investment amount. Thus, the viability of the investment is straightly tied to the region where the wind turbine is installed, and the government incentives may allow decreasing in the investment amount for wind power. Based on this, incentives programs for the production of clean energy include cheaper purchase of wind turbines, lower taxing and financing rates, can make wind power more profitable and attractive.

Highlights

Since the 1960s and affected by the oil crisis episode, the situation of fossil resource level, which is the main source of energy, has become alarming
This work, an economic feasibility analysis a project electric power generationfrom fromwind. In this an economic feasibility analysis of aofproject of of electric power generation wind power in an small business (SB) located in the northeast region was carried out
Conclusions showed that the wind speed has the main influence on the problem, followed by similar amounts between the cost of the investment and the energy tariff

Summary

Introduction

Since the 1960s and affected by the oil crisis episode, the situation of fossil resource level, which is the main source of energy, has become alarming. At the same period, the renewable energy sector attracted more investment and greater efforts for technological progress in order to develop an alternative to fossil fuels [1,2]. Rocha et al [3] stated that renewable energy refers to the form of energy that occurs naturally in a continuous and infinite way. The popularity of wind power has increased due to environmental problems, fossil fuels price volatility, as well as the risks and geopolitical uncertainties related to the dependence on imports of these fossil resources [1,4,5]. Mohammadi and Mehrpooya [6] state that the global fossil resources consumption growth, results in several challenges because fossil fuels are exhaustible in the near future, and their combustion leads to environmental problems such as the ozone layer

Objectives

Methods

Conclusion