1. A hybrid renewable energy system for a North American off-grid community
- Author
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Mohammad Ahsan Ullah, Md. Mohib-Ul-Haque Khan, Md. Mustafizur Rahman, Amit Kumar, and Xiaolei Zhang
- Subjects
Engineering ,Waste management ,business.industry ,020209 energy ,Mechanical Engineering ,02 engineering and technology ,Building and Construction ,Environmental economics ,Pollution ,Electrical grid ,Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering ,Renewable energy ,Diesel fuel ,General Energy ,020401 chemical engineering ,Greenhouse gas ,Hybrid system ,0202 electrical engineering, electronic engineering, information engineering ,Electricity ,0204 chemical engineering ,Electrical and Electronic Engineering ,business ,Feed-in tariff ,Civil and Structural Engineering ,Renewable resource - Abstract
Canada has many isolated communities that are not connected to the electrical grid. Most of these communities meet their electricity demand through stand-alone diesel generators. Diesel generators have economic and environmental concerns that can be minimized by using hybrid renewable energy technologies. This study aims to assess the implementation of a hybrid energy system for an off-grid community in Canada and to propose the best hybrid energy combination to reliably satisfy electricity demand. Seven scenarios were developed: 1) 100% renewable resources, 2) 80% renewable resources, 3) 65% renewable resources, 4) 50% renewable resources, 5) 35% renewable resources, 6) 21% renewable resources, and 7) battery-diesel generators (0% renewable resources). A case study for the remote community of Sandy Lake, Ontario, was conducted. Hybrid systems were chosen to meet the requirements of a 4.4 MWh/day primary load with a 772 kW peak load. Sensitivity analyses were carried out to assess the impact of solar radiation, wind speed, diesel price, CO2 penalty cost, and project interest rate on optimum results. A GHG (greenhouse gas) abatement cost was assessed for each scenario. Considering GHG emission penalty cost, the costs of electricity for the seven scenarios are $1.48/kWh, $0.62/kWh, $0.54/kWh, $0.42/kWh, $0.39/kWh, $0.37/kWh, and $0.36/kWh.
- Published
- 2016
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