Advances in Energy Research

Volume 3, Number 4, 2015, pages 251-263

DOI: 10.12989/eri.2015.3.4.251

Techno-economic viability of a hybrid wind and solar power system for electrification of a commercial building in Shiraz, Iran

Abtin Ataei, Reza Rashidi, Mojtaba Nedaei and Elnaz Kurdestani

Abstract

In this paper, techno-economic viability of a hybrid Wind/PV system with a battery and inverter was performed using the HOMER international optimization model. A commercial building in Shiraz, Iran was selected as a case study to analyze the feasibility study of installing the proposed hybrid Wind/PV system. Before the optimization process, different key parameters such as the monthly wind and solar resource, monthly and daily electrical load consumption, economic constraints such as interest rate and project lifetime, the components features such as the battery or inverters sizes and costs and other related information were collected and imported into HOMER. The optimization results suggested that the most efficient and economical hybrid energy system is a combination of 9 kW photovoltaic panel, 1 wind turbine (10 kW), 5 batteries and 5 kW converter. The total net present cost (NPC) and the cost of energy (COE) for this system were estimated to be $89,884 and $0.619/kWh. The final results of the study concluded that the employment of the proposed hybrid energy system for electrification of the studied commercial building in Shiraz is highly recommended.

Key Words

renewable energy; hybrid system; PV array; wind turbine; HOMER

Address

Abtin Ataei, Reza Rashidi, Mojtaba Nedaei and Elnaz Kurdestani: Department of Energy Engineering, Graduate School of the Environment and Energy, Science and Research Branch, Islamic Azad University, Tehran, Iran