Quantifying agricultural productive use of energy load in Sub-Saharan Africa and its impact on microgrid configurations and costs

Farthing, Amanda; Rosenlieb, Evan; Steward, Darlene; Reber, Tim; Njobvu, Clement; Moyo, Chrispin

doi:10.1016/j.apenergy.2023.121131

Cited by 14 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 22 publications

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“…Expected load profiles were developed based on adapting past hourly load profiles for cold storage, shelling, grinding, milling, egg incubation, and other technologies from PUE studies in Africa. 45,46,47,48 Seasonality for certain crop PUE applications (e.g., shelling and grinding) was developed based on the seasonality for crop production. For example, for the de-shelling, potential PUE load was scaled based on the seasonal production of groundnuts with 100% of full potential load in the spring months, 82% of full potential load in the autumn months, and 78% of full potential load in the winter months (see Section 4.1 Agrivoltaic Archetypes below for modeled equipment and load/utilization assumptions).…”

Section: Figure 3 Sample Mini-grid Communities For Agrivoltaic Modeli...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Adapting Agrivoltaics for Solar Mini-Grids in Haiti

Bilich,

Staie,

McCall

et al. 2024

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Section: Figure 3 Sample Mini-grid Communities For Agrivoltaic Modeli...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Adapting Agrivoltaics for Solar Mini-Grids in Haiti

Bilich,

Staie,

McCall

et al. 2024

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“…Seasonally used PUEs in particular may offer only little improvements in the system costs, as they require additional energy system assets to meet peak demand during the high season, which are under-utilized during the low season [21]. These two examples (for other similar examples, see [25,26]) support our suggestion that in order to ensure economic improvements in off-grid electricity supply via integration of PUE, the energy consumption patterns of the PUE appliances (notably determined via usage patterns and community preferences) need to fit into the household residential electricity consumption patterns to avoid costly additional production (and storage) devices being required to power the PUE, aside from the residential loads.…”

Section: Introduction 1background and Theoretical Foundationsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Matchmaking in Off-Grid Energy System Planning: A Novel Approach for Integrating Residential Electricity Demands and Productive Use of Electricity

Schöne,

Britton,

Delatte

et al. 2024

Sustainability

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Off-grid electrification planning increasingly recognizes the importance of productive use of electricity (PUE) to promote community value creation and (financial) project sustainability. To ensure a sustainable and efficient integration in the community and energy system, PUE assets must be carefully evaluated to match both the community needs and the residential electricity demand patterns. We propose a novel methodology interlinking qualitative interviews, statistical analysis and energy system modeling to optimize decision making for PUE integration in off-grid energy systems in rural Madagascar by aligning relevant PUE effectively with anticipated residential electricity demand patterns based on socio-economic determinants of the community. We find that a possible contribution of the PUE to reducing the electricity costs depends significantly on three factors: (1.) The residential electricity consumption patterns, which are influenced by the socio-economic composition of the community; (2.) The degree of flexibility of (i) PUE assets and (ii) operational preferences of the PUE user; and (3.) The capacity of community members to finance and operate PUE assets. Our study demonstrates that significant cost reductions for PUE-integrated off-grid energy systems can be achieved by applying our proposed methodology. When matching PUE and residential consumption patterns, the integration of PUE assets in residential community energy systems can reduce the financial risk for operators, provided the PUE enterprise operates reliably and sustainably. We highlight that the consideration of local value chains and co-creation approaches are essential to ensure the energy system is addressing the community’s needs, creates value for the community, enhances the project’s financial sustainability and is achieving the overall objectives of decentralized energy system planning.

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“…Especially seasonally used PUE may offer only little improvements of the system costs, as they require additional energy system assets to meet peak demand in the high season that under-utilized during the low season [21]. These two examples (for other similar examples see [25,26]) support our suggestion that to ensure economic improvements of off-grid electricity supply via integration of PUE the energy consumption patterns of the PUE appliances (notably determined via usage patterns and community preferences) need to fit into the household residential electricity consumption patterns to avoid costly additional production (and storage) devices being required to power the PUE aside from the residential loads.…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Matchmaking in Off-Grid Energy System Planning: A Novel Approach for Integrating Residential Electricity Demands and Productive Use of Electricity

Schöne,

Britton,

Delatte

et al. 2024

Preprint

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

Off-grid electrification planning increasingly recognizes the importance of productive use of electricity (PUE) to promote community value creation and (financial) project sustainability. To ensure a sustainable and efficient integration in the community and energy system, PUE assets must carefully be evaluated to match both the community needs and the residential electricity demand patterns. We propose a novel methodology interlinking qualitative interviews, statistical analysis, and energy system modelling to optimize decision-making for PUE integration in off-grid energy systems in rural Madagascar by aligning relevant PUE effectively with anticipated residential electricity demand patterns based on socio-economic determinants of the community. We find that a possible contribution of the PUE to reducing the electricity costs depends signifi-cantly on three factors: 1. the residential electricity consumption patterns that are influenced by the socio-economic composition of the community, 2. the degree of flexibility of i) PUE assets and ii) operational preferences of the PUE user, and 3. the capacity of community members to finance and operate PUE assets. Our study demonstrates that significant cost reductions for PUE-integrated off-grid energy systems can be achieved by applying our proposed methodology. When matching PUE and residential consumption patterns, the integration of PUE assets in residential community energy system can reduce the financial risk of operators, provided the PUE enterprise operates reliably and sustainably. We highlight that the consideration of local value chains and co-creation approaches are essential to ensure the energy system is addressing the community’s needs, creates value for the community, enhances the project´s financial sustainability, and is achieving the overall objectives of decentralized energy system planning.

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Quantifying agricultural productive use of energy load in Sub-Saharan Africa and its impact on microgrid configurations and costs

Cited by 14 publications

References 22 publications

Adapting Agrivoltaics for Solar Mini-Grids in Haiti

Adapting Agrivoltaics for Solar Mini-Grids in Haiti

Matchmaking in Off-Grid Energy System Planning: A Novel Approach for Integrating Residential Electricity Demands and Productive Use of Electricity

Matchmaking in Off-Grid Energy System Planning: A Novel Approach for Integrating Residential Electricity Demands and Productive Use of Electricity

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