Total Net Present Cost Research Articles

Utilization of Animal Solid Waste for Electricity Generation in the Northwest of Iran 3E Analysis for One-Year Simulation

Today, the use of renewable energy is increasing day by day. The most susceptible to renewable energy is biomass energy because it depends directly on the size of the population and does not have the problems of other renewable energies such as lack of access day and night and constant change throughout the year. For this reason, animal solid waste has been used in the research to supply electrical energy to the study area. In this regard, the amount of animal waste is considered as a source of biomass input energy. HOMER software was used to simulate the system under study. To better compare the competitiveness of this energy, photovoltaic systems and wind turbines have been used as different scenarios of electrical energy production in the study area. The results of scenario analysis showed that in all designed systems, the highest amount of energy production was in July and was related to the hottest season of the year. Among hybrid systems, the biomass system has a higher priority than other systems due to the minimum cost of energy production and total net present cost (NPC). The amount of exhaust gas from the biomass system reached 53.5 kg/yr and the biomass-wind and biomass-wind-solar systems reached 52.5 kg/yr and 52.2 kg/yr, respectively. The surplus generated electricity also increases from 2.91% to 6.65% from the biomass-wind system to the biomass-with-solar system.

Performance evaluation of renewable-based sustainable micro-grid under predictive management control strategy: A case study of Gado refugee camp in Cameroon

The recent use of hybrid renewable energy systems (HRESs) is considered one of the most reliable ways to improve energy access to decentralized communities because of their techno-economic and environmental benefits. Many distant locales, such as camps in war-torn nations, lack basic necessities like power. This study proposes a remedy for power outages in these areas; by designing an HRES and a control system for monitoring, distributing, and managing the electrical power from sustainable energy sources to supply the load. Hence, providing affordable, reliable, and clean energy for all (Sustainable Development Goal 7). In this study, the feasibility and techno-economic performance of an HRES for a refugee camp was evaluated under load following (LF), cycle charging (CC), and predictive control strategy (PS). The optimization results revealed that the PS was the most suitable, as it had the lowest cost and was more eco-friendly and energy-efficient. The predictive control strategy had a 48-h foresight of the load demand and resource potential and hence could effectively manage the HRES. The total net present cost (NPC) for the electrification of this refugee camp was $3,809,822.54, and the cost of electricity generated for every kWh is $0.2018. Additionally, 991,240.32 kg of emissions can be avoided annually through the hybridization of the diesel generator under the PS.

Roadmap to urban energy internet: Techno-enviro-economic analysis of renewable electricity and natural gas integrated energy system

The integrated energy system which coordinates natural gas, renewable energy, and other energy subsystems is an effective way to promote a low-carbon economy. An effective framework for system assessment and optimisation is a critical issue. This paper takes a natural gas-wind-photovoltaic integrated energy system as the research object and uses the simulation software to analyse its techno-enviro-economic feasibility. Firstly, a mathematical model is customised to optimise the system installation and operation plans. Renewable electricity replaces some natural gas, resulting in pipeline pressure fluctuation. Here, the Stoner Pipeline Simulator software is used to simulate pipeline network operation to quantify the aforementioned pressure fluctuations. The proportion of renewable energy is gradually reduced until the network pressure fluctuation is less than 20% to ensure the stability of pipeline operation. Then, the optimal operation scheme can be determined. Taking three cities in Shandong, China, as cases, the results show that the proposed system is beneficial for urban energy internet development: (i) the total net present cost is reduced by 19.7%, 19.8%, and 20.8%, (ii) annual CO2 emission is reduced by 23.7%, 18.4%, and 12.2%; (iii) the levelised cost of energy is 0.142 $/kWh, 0.143$/kWh, and 0.153$/kWh.

Feasibility Analysis and Economic Viability of Standalone Hybrid Systems for Marudi Electrification in Sarawak, Malaysia

A hybrid renewable energy system is a feasible solution for off-grid electrification where grid electricity is not available due to economic or technical limitations. In this study, rural electrification is performed on a small longhouse settlement, Long Moh, in Sarawak, Malaysia, with a population of 308 from 70 households. Initially, a hybrid PV/Hydro/DG/Battery system is proposed due to the abundance of solar and hydro resources in the village. There have been a lot of studies based on PV/DG/Battery systems in Malaysia but less with the inclusion of hydropower. Through simulation and optimization process, the most optimal system in terms of Net Present Cost (NPC) is found to be a hybrid Hydro/DG/Battery system which provides a total NPC of $213,694.90, cost of electricity of $0.08/kWh, and operating cost of $9,495.56/year. The most environmentally friendly system is the proposed PV/Hydro/DG/Battery system due to less fuel consumption (12,863.63 L/year) and its high renewable penetration. The standalone diesel generator (DG) system was the least economic and most polluting system. The best system overall for rural electrification at the case study location is a hybrid Hydro/DG/battery system due to its relatively low NPC and emissions output compared to a standalone DG system.

Modeling the effects of ecosystem changes on seagrass wrack valorization: Merging system dynamics with life cycle assessment

Seagrass meadows, while recognized as essential ecosystem service providers, are degrading worldwide. This has a profound impact on the environment but also on socioeconomic systems which hope to utilize beach-cast seagrass (wrack) as a bioresource. This study integrates system dynamics (SD) thinking with life cycle assessment (LCA) and life cycle costing (LCC) to understand how a degraded ecosystem feedbacks into the circular bioeconomy. An SD model was created to assess the impacts of seagrass meadow changes on wrack production and on ecosystem services accounting, considering an Italian case study of wrack deposited on a beach. Environmental and economic impacts of wrack valorization through anaerobic digestion (AD) were then determined through LCA and LCC. Finally, an extended LCC combined the results of the SD model, LCA, and LCC to demonstrate the cost of seagrass meadow degradation and the value of restoration. The results confirmed complexities in stakeholder perspective within the waste-to-resource framework. For the AD operator, meadow restoration would increase the profits from wrack valorization (23.10 €/ton), while for the municipality, meadow degradation would reduce the high costs associated with management (104.29–140.00 €/ton). When also considering the impacts on the environment and local community, valuation of ecosystem services and cost of restoration were influential. Meadow restoration with wrack valorization was the most favorable option if the natural capital of the seagrass meadows was valued appropriately (>0.065 €/m2) and direct costs of restoration could be kept relatively low (<1179 €/ha). Overall, the model resulted in a total net present cost of −3.161,462.40 € for the baseline scenario, −1,488,277.28 € for the scenario of wrack valorization, and −1,231,325.12 € for the scenario of wrack valorization and meadow restoration.

Performance analysis of autonomous green energy system based on multi and hybrid metaheuristic optimization approaches

The need for energy is constantly increasing worldwide. It is expected that renewable energy resources and fuel cells, solid wastes, and hydrogen energy technologies will play a significant role in energy generation and storage with their decreasing installation costs and increasing environmental concerns. Hydrogen is a potential fuel used in fuel cells that provides a carbon-free solution. The research is based on the techno-economics of off-grid wind (WT), solar (PV), biomass gasifier (BG), and fuel cell (FC) systems, which include storing excess wind and solar energy by converting it to hydrogen to provide fuel cell energy. It is critical from the standpoint of feasibility. In addition to electricity generation, energy storage integration, sizing methodologies, energy flow management, and the optimization algorithms that go with them are all covered. The annual cost system (ACS) is the primary goal function of the optimization process in this case. A robust rule-based energy management scheme is proposed to coordinate the power flow between various system components of a microgrid that will minimize the ACS and meet the energy demand reliably. The decision variables considered for this optimization process are PV panel power, WT power, and number of H2 tanks. The consumption and meteorological data of the year 2021 are used as the input of the system. The optimal size of each component is obtained by using the proposed Hybrid Firefly Genetic Algorithm (HFGA). To prove the superiority of the proposed optimization method in terms of accuracy and calculation time, it is compared to approaches that are used in similar applications such as Genetic Algorithms, the Firefly Algorithm, Sine-Cosine Algorithm and Cuckoo Search Algorithm. The optimum system configuration yielded 1094.68 KW WT, 2256.17 kW PV, and 775 H2 storage tanks when HFGA was used. The ACS of the system is $2921702.3, the total net present cost is $2.4639x107, while the leveled unit energy cost is $1.3416/kWh 'dir. The renewable energy fraction of the system is 100 % and consists of 51.8 % PV, 2.1 % WT, 11.8 % FC 34.3 % BG components. The results show that the proposed standalone hybrid (PV/WT/BG/FC) energy system is the most cost-effective option for the central campus of the university selected as the study area, and the proposed algorithm has excellent convergence capacity and provides high-quality outputs. The optimization algorithms are programmed using the MATLAB simulation package in this study.

Multi-Objective MPSO/GA Optimization of an Autonomous PV-Wind Hybrid Energy System

This article presents a study of the energy efficiency and the optimal sizing of an autonomous hybrid energy system (PV-wind-battery) as a power source for a typical household in an isolated village in Adrar, Algeria using the multi-objective Particle Swarm Optimization (MPSO) algorithm and Genetic Algorithm (GA). This study presents a new approach to obtain an optimal configuration and sizing of the main components integrated into the autonomous hybrid system (PV/wind) which meets the requirements of the desired system. In the first phase, the reliability criterion (LPSP) is met with the lowest Energy Cost (EC) value (min Total Net Present Cost (TNPC)). The required storage bank must have a low rate of aging in order to extend the battery life, which contributes to the reduction of the overall cost of the system. Due to the inability to meet the needs demanded by random load profiles, we have incorporated a complementary approach to home insulation to significantly improve energy efficiency. In order to improve the thermal comfort of the house and reduce the energy consumed by air conditioning and heating, a thermal and energy study on this house has been evaluated using TRNSYS 18 simulation software for the overall thermal and energy behavior of a habitat and its environment in dynamic regime. The simulation results show that the thermal insulation of the walls reduces energy consumption by 13.39% in the case of heating and by 10% in the case of air conditioning. Assuming a 10% decrease in energy needs for heating and air conditioning, we observe its positive effect on optimizing the battery lifetime.

Optimal renewable integrated rural energy planning for sustainable energy development

The renewable energy sources substitute traditional generation systems that can supply more reliable, environmentally friendly, and high-quality power. The off-grid electrification utilizing the integration of renewable energy systems is widely used to satisfy the energy need of remote rural areas. Due to intermittency in renewable production, energy storage balances the power demand against variable generation. The present study investigates the economic viability of a standalone hybrid energy system for a remote village in Uttarakhand (India). The suggested system consists of a Photovoltaic system, diesel generators, biogas generators, wind turbines, and batteries to meet the load demand of the area. The proposed microgrid utilized differential evolution (DE) to optimize the hybrid microgrid's sizing and economic analysis. The effectiveness of the proposed DE optimization results is compared with HOMER (Hybrid optimization of multi-energy resources), PSO (particle swarm optimization), and GA (Genetic algorithm). In addition, a sensitivity analysis is performed on the cost of energy for varying sensory inputs. The results indicate that DE can optimally size the system compared to its counterpart, HOMER, PSO, and GA. The decrement of 3.34%, 5.5%, and 7 % are achieved respectively in the total net present cost of the optimal configuration. However, it has been established that the suggested system is a more cost-effective and feasible system for rural area electrification.

A Case Study of an Optimal Detailed Analysis of a Standalone Photovoltaic/Battery System for Electricity Supply in Rural and Remote Areas

This paper focused on a techno-economic study of a standalone PV/battery system for electrical energy supply. For a particular case study in Cameroon, the system is optimally designed thanks to a double-objective firefly optimization algorithm, based on a defined operational strategy. The two objective functions simulated simultaneously using FA are: the cost of energy (COE) function and the function defining the loss of power supply probability (LPSP). Different optimal configurations of the system have been obtained on the Pareto front with respect to their LPSP. For a total load demand of 20196.7 kWh, the lowest cost configuration with LPSP of 0% is composed by a number of 63 modules and a battery capacity of 370.295 kWh. The related COE is 0.2587 $/kWh, corresponding to a total net present cost of 87422 $. However with this configuration, the energy of batteries could not be able solely to respond to the energy demand for 3 continuous days. In that case, the increase of the PV power production (by increasing the number of PV modules) could allow to the batteries to fulfil this deficiency. But this solution increases the investment cost to up to 11.17%, considering a system with 80 PV modules. Another solution consists in reducing the size of the battery bank to avoid its unnecessary oversizing. In this case, the COE and the system investment cost reduce to up to 28.77% for 1 day batteries’ autonomy considered. The obtained results have demonstrated that the cost of a PV/battery system is mostly influenced by the batteries’ size, while the system reliability is mostly related to the PV size.

Optimization sizing of an autonomous photovoltaic-battery microgrid system

This article describes a photovoltaic-battery microgrid system used for isolated sites. Indeed, a 50 kW photovoltaic panel is associated with a boost converter. To guarantee more reliable and economical energy supply, a battery storage system is included within the microgrid system. To determine the optimal sizing of the microgrid system, many approaches have been proposed. However, these approaches need a big database applied throughout a year, which can make the sizing more expensive and required a long computing time. In this article, a new approach is proposed, using real weather data (solar radiation and ambient temperature). It is based on two technical criteria; the deficiency of power supply probability and the relative excess power generated to study the system reliability and two economic criteria; the energy cost and the total net present cost to study the system cost. Compared to other approaches, sizing results applied for a year can be deduced using just the month when the microgrid system can work at the optimum conditions with optimal configuration (photovoltaic power and battery) achieving a minimal cost energy without deficiency of power supply probability, which make the sizing simpler and less expensive. The results obtained prove the effectiveness of the proposed approach in sizing problem. All results have been checked carrying out MATLAB simulations using real weather data.

Feasibility and Techno-Economic Analysis of Electric Vehicle Charging of PV/Wind/Diesel/Battery Hybrid Energy System with Different Battery Technology

Promoting the development of green technologies and replacing fossil fuel vehicles with electric ones can abate the environmental anxieties and issues associated with energy supply security. The increasing demand for electric vehicles requires an upgrade and expansion of the available charging infrastructure to accommodate the fast public adoption of this type of transportation. Ethiopia set a pro-electric cars policy and made them excise-free even before the first electric vehicle charging stations were launched by Marathon Motors Engineering in 2021. This paper presents the first ever technical, economic and environmental evaluation of electric vehicle charging stations powered by hybrid intermittent generation systems in three cities in Ethiopia. This paper tests this model using three different battery types: Lead-acid (LA), Flow-Zince-Bromine (ZnBr) and Lithium-ion (LI), used individually. Using these three battery technologies, the proposed hybrid systems are then compared in terms of system sizing, economy, technical performance and environmental stability. The results show that the feasible configuration of Solar Photovoltaic (PV)/Diesel Generator (DG)/ZnBr battery systems provide the lowest net present cost (NPC), with values of $2.97M, $2.72M and $2.85M, and cost of energy (COE), with values $0.196, $0.18 and $0.188, in Addis Ababa, Jijiga and Bahir Dar, respectively. Of all feasible systems, the Wind Turbine (WT)/PV/LI, PV/LI and WT/PV/LI configurations have the highest values of NPC and COE in Addis Ababa, Jijiga and Bahir Dar. Using this configuration, the results demonstrate that ZnBr battery is the most favorable choice because the economic parameters, including total NPC and COE, are found to be lowest.

Optimal Configuration and Techno-Economic Analysis of Hybrid Photovoltaic/PEM Fuel Cell Power System

In this study, a renewable energy-based hybrid system was designed capable of meeting known electrical load requirements, as the system includes a combination of photovoltaic cells (PV), a fuel cell, batteries, an electrolyzer, and a hydrogen tank. This hybrid system supplies the cell tower located in the village of Ouanougha, country of Algeria with the annual electrical energy demand of 47 kWh/day. A Hybrid optimization model for electric renewable (HOMER) simulation software is utilized for modeling, optimize sizing, simulation as well as performing the techno-economic analysis of this hybrid system. HOMER software gives several optimum system configurations, which are compared among themselves for identifying the optimum system configuration. The comparison is based on the total net present cost (TNPC) and levelized cost of energy (LCOE). Other cost parameters can be provided such as initial capital cost, operation, and maintenance cost (O&amp;M). The simulation result shows that, the proposed hybrid system has the lowest TNPC, LCOE and Initial capital, which are 64,384 $, 0.259 \$/kWh and 35,850 \$, respectively. On the other hand, it proved that the hybrid system is environmentally friendly and without producing any polluting gas. This paper also focuses on the operational strategy for feeding the load, as the results show that the hybrid system generally fulfills the requirements of the load.

Modeling and sensitivity analysis of grid-connected hybrid green microgrid system

The demonstrated research work analyses the technoeconomic modelling and sensitivity analysis of the available resources for the rural community in India. The various resources used in this study are solar, wind, hydro, battery and utility grid-connected system. The usefulness of the on-grid system in the rural sector is that excess amount of electricity produced through renewable energy sources (RES) could be sold back to the utility grid. A total of 12 possible configurations of various resources with and without a grid-connected system was analyzed for minimum Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE) and Total Net Present Cost (TNPC). Further, sensitivity analysis is accomplished for different sensitive variables to understand the nature of the system for wider application in rural communities. The solar-wind-hydro-based utility grid-connected network is observed to be the best optimal configuration with a minimum value of LCOE of 0.056 $/kWh. The simulation results reveal that the effective utilization of RES has been a cost-efficient and reliable system to the power supply in remote communities.

Exploration on the feasibility of hybrid renewable energy generation in resource-based areas of China: Case study of a regeneration city

In order to explore the feasibility of hybrid renewable energy generation in resource-based areas in China, this paper takes a regeneration city as an example. The technical, economic, and environmental optimization design of the hybrid energy systems for the considered tiny village in Nanyang of Henan province are carried out using HOMER Pro software. The study demonstrates the multi-year and single-year modules of the HOMER Pro software with the advanced storage module. The load following (LF), cyclic charging (CC), and combined dispatch (CD) strategies are adopted in this study. The results indicate that the optimal photovoltaic (PV)-wind turbine (WT)-diesel generator (DG)-battery system under the CD strategy, consisting of 250 kW PV arrays, a WT, a 360 kW DG, 10 battery units, and a 150 kW converter, is the most economically viable with a total net present cost (NPC) of $1,795,558 and cost of energy of $0.378/kWh. The present worth is $5,827,278, which is the difference between the NPC of the DG system and the PV-WT-DG-battery hybrid system. From the perspective of economic and environmental, the PV-WT-battery system is the best among the studied systems. Moreover, the annual CO2 emissions of the optimal PV-WT-DG-battery system as a proposed system is 71,988 kg/year. The optimal PV-WT-DG-battery system reduces CO2 emissions by 89.4% per year compared with DG-only system. The amounts of CO2 emissions emitted from the PV-WT-DG-battery system increase with the number of years, while the renewable fraction values decrease with the number of years.

Feasibility evaluation of an off‐grid solar‐biomass system for remote area electrification considering various economic factors

AbstractOff‐grid renewable energy systems are a solution for power generation in areas where access to the grid is not possible or cost‐effective; in particular, low population rural areas located far away from grid lines or in rugged terrains. Furthermore, over‐reliance on fossil fuels for supplying global energy demand has led to the depletion of nonrenewable resources and environmental issues. This paper presents a feasibility assessment of an off‐grid hybrid renewable energy system for a remote rural area in Kohgiluye and Boyer‐Ahmad Province in Iran. Regarding the available energy resources in the region, a photovoltaic (PV)‐biomass energy system is considered. HOMER Pro software is utilized to find the optimized sizing of the PV‐biomass system to fulfill this load demand. The objective function in this optimization is the system's total net present cost. Due to the rapid fluctuation of economic factors in the country, several rates of inflation and discount rate are considered to investigate their influence on the costs of the system. The optimization result for the current inflation rate of 40% and the discount rate of 18% in the country proposes a hybrid energy system consisting of a 3 kW biogas‐fueled generator, 4.74 kW PV, 10 kWh battery, and 2.07 kW converter to meet the 2.64 kW peak load and 14.53 kWh/day consumption of the community. The total net present cost and cost of energy are $93,057 and 0.0933 $/kWh, respectively. Finally, the environmental assessment of the proposed hybrid system shows an annual CO2 emission of 2.95 kg, which means 99.9% CO2 emissions mitigation compared to a conventional coal‐based electrical plant.

Potential of a Nonperennial Tributary Integrated with Solar Energy for Rural Electrification: A Case Study of Ikukwa Village in Tanzania

This study evaluates the hydropower potential in the design of a micro-hydro/solar photovoltaic hybrid system with battery energy storage for increasing the access to electricity in Ikukwa Village in Mbeya Region of Tanzania. Usually, hybridized hydropower schemes are designed from perennial streams for the provision of electricity. This study incorporates the run-of-the river (COE) power scheme, which originates from the untapped potential of nonperennial hydro-energy source and the use of traditional approach of data measurements for Ikata tributary to design hybrid system. The system is optimized by the minimization of the total net present cost (NPC) and cost of energy (COE) using the soft computing method of Hybrid Optimization of Multiple Energy Resources (HOMER) software and artificial intelligent (AI) techniques. AI optimization techniques such as particle swarm optimization (PSO), grey wolf optimization (GWO), and GWO-PSO hybrid (GWO-PSOHD) algorithms have been employed for further optimal results. The data for solar radiation and the tributary have been obtained from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) and traditional methods of measurements, respectively. The estimated maximum water flow rate and head are 2.943 m3/s and 13 m, respectively. In the same period, the approximated theoretical power potential of the tributary is found to be 375 kW. Total NPCs obtained from HOMER, PSO, GWO, and GWO-PSOHD methods are $ 141, 397.76, $ 95 167.21, $ 92 472.82, and $ 91,854.10, respectively. Similarly, the optimal results of COE from HOMER, PSO, GWO, and GWO-PSOHD approaches are $ 0.1818/kWh, $ 0.1185/kWh, $ 0.1182/kWh, and $ 0.1181/kWh, respectively. Comparatively, PSO implementation has indicated the greatest energy cost, while the cost acquired by GWO-PSOHD is the lowest for all aforementioned AI optimization techniques. The tributary under study has a high potential of diversification of energy sources for rural electrification in the area of study and other parts of the world with comparable conditions.

Analysis and techno-economic assessment of renewable hydrogen production and blending into natural gas for better sustainability

In this study, comprehensive thermodynamic analysis and techno-economic assessment studies of the renewable hydrogen production and its blending with natural gas in the existing pipelines are performed. Solar and wind energy-based on-grid and off-grid power systems are designed and compared in energy, exergy, and cost. Solar PV panels and wind turbines are particularly considered for electricity and hydrogen production for residential applications in an environmentally benign way. Fuel cell units are included to supply continuous electricity in the off-grid system. Here, the heat required for a community consisting of 100 houses is provided by hydrogen and natural gas mixture as a more environmentally benign fuel. The costs of capital, fuel, operation, and maintenance are calculated and evaluated in detail. The total net present costs are calculated as $6.95 million and $2.47 million for the off-grid and on-grid power systems, respectively. For the off-grid system, energy and exergy efficiencies are calculated as 32.64% and 40.73%, respectively. Finally, the energy and exergy efficiencies of the on-grid system are determined as 26.58% and 35.25%, respectively.

Effective dispatch strategies assortment according to the effect of the operation for an islanded hybrid microgrid

The optimized design of a freestanding hybrid microgrid for various distinct dispatch controls is assessed in this paper, which considers the optimal sizes of individual components, system response, and reliability analysis. The effective design and management of stand-alone islanded hybrid smartgrids are getting increasingly importance and influences as the prevalence of renewable energy in microgrids grows. Melville Island, off the coast of eastern Queensland, Australia, is taken as the test microgrid in this study. For the optimal sizing and techno-economic assessment of the intended hybrid microgrid system consist of of solar diesel generator, PV , battery storage, and wind turbine, four dispatch approaches have been unitized: load following, generator order, combined dispatch, and cycle charging strategy. The proposed off-grid microgrid's CO2 emissions, total net present cost (NPC), and the Levelized cost of energy (LCOE) have all been optimized. In HOMER software, all the possible dispatch algorithms were analyzed, and the power system responses and reliability study were carried out using DIgSILENT PowerFactory. The findings of the study are useful for determining the optimum hybrid combination and available resources for the best performance of an off-grid microgrid employing various dispatch mechanisms. Following the simulation data, load-following is the best dispatch mechanism for stand-alone microgrid architecture since it has the lowest LCOE and NPC.

Optimization and enviro-economic assessment of hybrid sustainable energy systems: The case study of a photovoltaic/biogas/diesel/battery system in Xuzhou, China

The current study intends to optimally design and carry out the economic and environmental assessment of a hybrid photovoltaic/biogas/diesel/battery (PV/BG/DG/battery) sustainable system to meet the electricity load of a village in Xuzhou, east China. HOMER (Hybrid Optimization of Multiple Energy Resources) software was used to perform the analyses and the results indicated that the PV/BG/battery hybrid system comprising 400 kWp PV modules, a 100 KW biogas generators (BGs), 400 batteries, and a 200 kW sized converter was the most cost-effective one. Besides, the optimal system operated in the load following (LF) strategy and had a total net present cost (NPC) and a cost of energy (COE) of $1,808,992 and 0.24 $/kWh, respectively. Compared to diesel generator (DG), the proposed system would save 1,297,174 kg of carbon dioxide (CO2) per year. The PV/battery hybrid system is the most environmentally friendly one with a complete absence of emissions of pollutants, whereas the DG-only is the most polluted system with the most emissions of pollutants. Additionally, the sensitivity analysis results showed that a reduction in the costs of BGs and batteries could effectively reduce the cost of the hybrid PV/BG/battery system. The integration of PV and BGs into hybrid sustainable energy systems may be a good choice for villages in developing countries if economic and environmental considerations are taken into account.

Optimization and Power Management of Solar PV-based Integrated Energy System for Distributed Green Hydrogen Production

Photovoltaic-based integrated energy systems act as a possible modern technological solution for clean and affordable green hydrogen production. However, research attempts are required from the scientific community to develop power management, control, optimization algorithms, and new techniques for these integrated energy systems effective and economical operation. The integrated energy system considered in this work consists of a solar photovoltaic, battery, grid and proton exchange membrane (PEM) electrolyzer. PEM electrolyzer with a power rating of 100 kW is modelled as a controlled current sink to interfere with the DC bus directly. This work proposes a power management and control algorithm for the photovoltaic-based integrated energy system considering different parameters like availability of solar photovoltaic power, DC link voltage, battery state of charge (SOC), tariff and availability of grid power. Effective power-sharing among the different power sources increases system reliability and stability. Optimization is performed for optimal sizing and costing to achieve economical operation such that these photovoltaic-based integrated energy systems become affordable and are encouraged for wide use. The photovoltaic system operates at the maximum power point through a neural network-based control strategy; in addition to this, stacking in neural network topologies is also discussed for improving system accuracy in tracking the reference voltage for MPPT operation. The DC link voltage is controlled by interfacing the battery with the DC link via a bidirectional buck-boost power converter. The contribution of the work is to highlight the role of renewable energy sources for continuous green hydrogen production. Green hydrogen will be a critical driving force for the future transportation system, fuel cell-based power generation, and industries utilizing hydrogen in direct or indirect forms-that will help transition towards a carbon-free society. Optimization and time-domain simulation results indicated the economic and technical feasibility of the proposed photovoltaic-based integrated energy system for green hydrogen production with the best optimal configuration producing hydrogen at the cost of $ 4.806/kg and total net present cost of $749904.