Design and optimization of off‐grid hybrid renewable power plant with storage system for rural area in Rwanda

Abstract

In this paper, a system comprising a solar photovoltaic (PV)/micro-hydropower/battery bank/converter has been designed, modelled, simulated, and optimized for the rural area of Wimana village, Rwanda. The total load has been fairly estimated for the residential electric utility needs. To satisfy the load demand, solar photovoltaic (4 kW) and microhydro (15 kW) power capacity were considered as the main sources of energy to supply electricity. Either in peak load times or during low generation of primary sources, storage battery banks can also be discharged. The simulation and optimization were done based on the load demand, climatic data, the economics of integrated system components, and other parameters in which the total net present cost has to be minimized to select an economically feasible and technically capable hybrid power system. Based on the load profile of the data collected for the village, the daily energy consumption was found to be 180.99 kWh/day with a peak load demand of 18.56 kW. The net present cost and the cost of energy for the optimized power system amount to $78,763.26 and $0.0757/kWh respectively. HOMER Pro simulating software tool was used to design optimal off-grid and energy management systems.

Optimization of a Hybrid Off-Grid Solar PV—Hydro Power Systems for Rural Electrification in Cameroon

“…Computing the number of series connected batteries [4] where N bat_series is the number of series connected batteries, V bat is the voltage of a single battery. Te total number of batteries needed in the system is [4]…”

“…Renewables such as wind, hydro, and solar energy are essential for developing sustainable power systems for communities deprived of access to power. Te solar PV technology, among other renewables, has a lot of prospects because of its availability and environmental friendliness [4], but variations in solar irradiance limit the ability to reliably supply appliances without hybridizing with other energy sources. Te RE systems when coupled in a hybrid confguration are more reliable in the delivery of electricity [3].…”

Optimization Effect Analysis of ACM-PSO Integrating Individual Adjustment and Cross Operation on Microgrid DG Technology

“…To improve the power supply capacity of the power grid system in rural areas of Rwanda, Bedadi and Gebremichael proposed an electric power system based on the hybrid power model. Through empirical analysis of the power system proposed in the study, it was found that the power system not only had better power supply capacity than the traditional power system, but also had lower cost compared with the traditional power system [12]. Anh and Cao proposed an optimized energy management method based on intelligent optimization technology to solve the problem of poor isolation effect of mixed hot spots in MG.…”

“…The start and stop status of u n (t) is determined by the output of the micro power supply. The initialization of individual speed is to calculate the fitness value of the individual, and initialize the optimal individual, as shown in expression (12).…”