Applied Energy: Binayak Bhandari, Kyung-Tae Lee, Caroline Sunyong Lee, Chul-Ki Song, Ramesh K. Maskey, Sung-Hoon Ahn
Applied Energy: Binayak Bhandari, Kyung-Tae Lee, Caroline Sunyong Lee, Chul-Ki Song, Ramesh K. Maskey, Sung-Hoon Ahn
Applied Energy: Binayak Bhandari, Kyung-Tae Lee, Caroline Sunyong Lee, Chul-Ki Song, Ramesh K. Maskey, Sung-Hoon Ahn
Applied Energy
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/apenergy
h i g h l i g h t s
We propose two hybridization methods for small off-grid power systems consisting solar (PV), wind, & micro-hydro sources.
One of the methods was implemented in a mini-grid connecting Thingan and Kolkhop villages in Makawanpur District, Nepal.
The results can be applied to help achieve Millennium Development Goal 7: Ensuring environmental sustainability.
This is the first implementation anywhere comprising of three renewable energy power, in a single off-grid power system.
This research may be applied as a practical guide for implementing similar systems in various locations.
a r t i c l e i n f o a b s t r a c t
Article history: Several factors must be considered before adopting a full-phase power generation system based on
Received 10 June 2013 renewable energy sources. Long-term necessary data (for one year if possible) should be collected before
Received in revised form 5 March 2014 making any decisions concerning implementation of such a systems. To accurately assess the potential of
Accepted 10 July 2014
available resources, we measured solar irradiation, wind speed, and ambient temperature at two high-
Available online 13 August 2014
altitude locations in Nepal: the Lama Hotel in Rasuwa District and Thingan in Makawanpur District. Here,
we propose two practical, economical hybridization methods for small off-grid systems consisting
Keywords:
entirely of renewable energy sources—specifically solar photovoltaic (PV), wind, and micro-hydro
Distributed generation (DG)
Hybrid power system
sources. One of the methods was tested experimentally, and the results can be applied to help achieve
Micro hydro power (MHP) Millennium Development Goal 7: Ensuring environmental sustainability.
Mini grid Hydro, wind, and solar photovoltaic energy are the top renewable energy sources in terms of globally
Off-grid system installed capacity. However, no reports have been published about off-grid hybrid systems comprised of
Renewable energy (RE) all three sources, making this implementation the first of its kind anywhere. This research may be applied
as a practical guide for implementing similar systems in various locations. Of the four off-grid PV systems
installed by the authors for village electrification in Nepal, one was further hybridized with wind and
hydro power sources. This paper presents a novel approach for connecting renewable energy sources
to a utility mini-grid.
Ó 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.apenergy.2014.07.033
0306-2619/Ó 2014 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
B. Bhandari et al. / Applied Energy 133 (2014) 236–242 237
of systems based on renewable energy (RE), energy storage devices combining three RE power systems – hydro (20 kW), PV (5 kW),
and conventional generators are generally used as backup systems. and wind (3 kW) – was implemented in the remote villages of
However, distributed generation using two or more renewable Thingan and Kolkhop, Makawanpur District, Nepal. Fig. 1 shows
energy sources can also significantly increase the reliability [4,7– the locations of the two villages.
9]. Commercially viable hybrid renewal energy systems (HRES)
include PV–battery, PV–diesel, wind–battery, wind–diesel, PV–
wind–battery, and PV–wind–diesel–battery systems. 2. System specification
In the case of PV and wind power systems, long-term solar irra-
diance and wind speed data are required to improve predictions 2.1. PV–wind hybrid power system
about energy output. The available energy discrepancy between
PV and wind systems necessitates the use of battery banks with The PV–wind hybrid system was installed in Thingan, a village
adequate capacity to satisfy the demand for electricity [5,6]. located at 27°260 36.5400 N and 85°140 43.7300 E with an altitude of
A number of studies [2,10–15] have focused on optimizing 1347 m above sea level (asl).
renewable energy hybrid power systems with/without conven- An FZY-3KW type wind turbine, with 3-kW rated power, was
tional generation system backups. Jaramillo, Borja, and Huacuz installed in conjunction with the 5 kW PV system. Wind speed
[16] conducted a theoretical study of hypothetical facilities con- was measured using The RainWiseÒ WindLog which was setup at
sisting of wind power and hydropower. Margeta and Glasnovic the power plant site in Thingan. Fig. 2 shows the average wind
[17] analyzed a solar-hydro hybrid system that can provide contin- speed and gust wind speed for three consecutive days (September
uous electric power. Ahn et al. [18] explored the characteristics of 25–27, 2013). The PV system has 42 Nos. of KMO120 PV module.
an off-grid hybrid RE system and their implications regarding the Tables 1 and 2 list the specifications of the FZY-3kW wind turbine
reliability of the system. and KMO120 solar panel, respectively. In PV system design, it is
Bakos [19] performed a feasibility study of wind-pumped hydro essential to know the amount of solar irradiation available at a par-
storage system assisted by diesel generator in case of power short- ticular location at a given time. The solar irradiation varies
age. The system is designed such that wind farm supplies to the throughout the day. Fig. 3 shows a typical solar irradiation for a full
load first. Bekele and Tedesse [20] suggested a PV–hydro–wind day (February 25th, 2012).
hybrid system capable of supplying uninterrupted electricity for A hybrid charge controller and inverter were used to hybridize
a village in Ethiopia. HOMER was used to optimize six small hydro- the two systems. The power system has a battery bank capacity of
power potential together with wind PV systems. Ram Prabhakar 4800 Ah. Fig. 4 shows the hybrid PV–wind system installed in
and Ragavan [21] discussed power management strategies related Thingan.
to battery assisted PV–wind–hydro hybrid systems. A control tech-
nique was developed which estimates the load through the energy
balance model, dc-link voltage control and drop control. Fadaeene- 2.2. Micro hydro power plant
jad et al. [22] has studied PV–wind–battery hybrid and PV–wind–
diesel–battery hybrids with the aim of rural electrification in According to REDP report [30], to date more than 307 micro-
Malaysia. Akikur et al. [23] carried a study on stand-alone solar hydro plants and 3099 household solar systems have been
and hybrid systems, where the solar–wind hybrid, solar–hydro installed in remote areas of Nepal. Generally, a micro-hydro system
hybrid, solar–wind–diesel hybrid, solar–wind–diesel–hydro/biogas should be installed in a location that has ample stream water (river
hybrid have been discussed and viability and significance of solar run-off) throughout the year. Therefore, a careful survey was con-
energy (both in standalone and hybrid form) in global electrifica- ducted at the potential site. The current hydro system has a flow
tion have been shown. Meshram et al. [24] proposed a hypothetical rate of 27 liters per second (lps) and a net head of 130 m, with a
grid connected solar–hydro hybrid system. They proposed grid total electrical power output of 20 kW.
connected solar system to supply the power when solar energy is The micro-hydro power (MHP) plant was constructed in the
abundant in summer, and hydro system is cutoff during operation. Kolkhop village (27°270 15.5700 N and 85°120 55.8100 E, 931 m asl),
Similarly during the rainy season, when water is abundant, the grid Makawanpur District, 7 km from Thingan. Fig. 5 shows a three-
connected hydro system is brought in operation and the solar sys- dimensional CAD model of the MHP, Fig. 6 shows a labeled image
tem is cut off. Ismail et al. [25] performed a feasibility study and a of the MHP facility, and Table 3 lists the specifications of the MHP.
techno-economic analysis of a PV system with batteries and micro A detailed survey, design, fabrication, and installation of the entire
turbine acting as a backup supply for the system. Component siz- hydro system, was carried out by the authors.
ing and optimization has been performed by iterative method to
minimize the cost of energy (COE) production. Daud and Ismail
[26] designed and analyzed a PV–wind–diesel hybrid system for
a family house in Palestine considering efficiency and reliability
along with the dumped electric power. Menshsari et al. [27] dis-
cussed the optimization of hydro–wind–solar–fuel cell hybrid
using the ant colony algorithm. Saha et al. [28] proposed a hypo-
thetical hybrid system that employs wind–solar–biogas–micro
hydro hybrid as major energy sources and also use a diesel gener-
ator as emergency backup source. Almost all of the publications
have various purposes such as design for off-grid applications,
analysis, modeling, optimization, socio-economic study etc.
However the similarity in all of the above publications is that no
publication have ever reported the successful implementation of
the tri-hybrid system comprised of PV–Wind–Hydro systems with
storage devices. A team from the ‘Nepal Solar Volunteer Corps’
[29], including the authors and volunteers have installed four PV Fig. 1. Aerial view of the hybrid PV-wind and hydro system geographical layout for
off-grid systems in various parts of Nepal. In this study, a HRES the villages of Thingan and Kolkhop.
238 B. Bhandari et al. / Applied Energy 133 (2014) 236–242
10
Avg Wind Speed
9 Gust Wind Speed
8
Wind Speed (m/sec)
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
0
0:00 6:00 12:00 18:00 0:00 6:00 12:00 18:00 0:00 6:00 12:00 18:00
Time (Hour)
Fig. 2. Wind speed data at Thingan, 3.5 m from ground (1 min interval). Fig. 4. A hybrid system comprised of 5 kW PV and 3 kW wind systems, installed in
Thingan.
Table 1
Specification of the FZY-3 kW.
Power 3 kW
Type Permanent magnet generator
Rotor diameter 4.5 m
Rated speed 260/min Pelton Turbine
Start wind speed 3 m/s
Rated wind speed 10 m/s
Working wind speed 3–25 m/s
Speed regulation Yaw & magnetic resistance
Table 2
Specification of the KMO120.
900
Irradation (W/m2)
800
700
Irradiation (W/m2)
600
500
400
300
200
100
0
-100
0:00 4:00 8:00 12:00 16:00 20:00
Time (Hours)
The grid voltage of a mini-grid system fluctuates significantly period by the generating sources, the GTI routes excess power into
because of the large load ratio during peak and off-peak hours. the grid. When power production is insufficient, it allows power to
Consequently, fixed frequency inverters cannot be used to hybrid- be routed back to the load. In this study, a GTI was used to route
ize above two systems. A grid tie inverter (GTI) also called a ‘syn- excess power into the mini-grid connecting the two villages.
chronous inverter’ or ‘grid-interactive inverter’ is a special type A GTI uses an inbuilt oscillator to prevent the voltage from
of power inverter that converts direct current (DC) to alternating exceeding the grid voltage. GTIs have a fixed power factor of unity;
current (AC) and feeds it into an existing electrical grid by synchro- the voltage and current are perfectly aligned, and the phase angle
nizing its frequency with that of the grid (normally 50 or 60 Hz). is within 1° of the AC power grid. Another advantage of using GTIs
In general, GTIs cannot be used in standalone applications to synchronize multiple distributed generators (DG) is that GTIs
where utility power is not available. During a overproduction are designed to quickly disconnect themselves from the grid if it
B. Bhandari et al. / Applied Energy 133 (2014) 236–242 239
Fig. 7. Hybridization of the PV, wind, and hydro generators, using a hybrid charge controller and a battery charger.
240 B. Bhandari et al. / Applied Energy 133 (2014) 236–242
Fig. 8. Synchronization of the micro-hydro power system with the hybrid PV-wind system, using a grid tie inverter.
19
Table 5
Residential electricity consumption in the US (2010) [20].
TVs 7%
17.5
0000000
MCB
Circuit Breakers/
Switches
L L
N
E
Energy Meter L
N N
E
L
N
E
Neutral Bar
Earth Bar
Earth
Table 6 villagers tend to mechanize house chores and farming to save time
Typical daily electricity demand for a remote village based on agriculture. and labor while maximizing production. Table 6 summarizes the
Particulars Power Hours Energy/day demand created by expanding residential electricity consumption
Straw/grass chopper 2 kW 1h 2 kWh from elementary lighting (max 2.2 kWh/month) to moderate
Water pump 750 Watts 1h 0.750 kWh domestic usage.
Fan 100 Watts 4h 0.4 kWh Based on power consumption data for electrical appliances,
Television 100 Watts 4h 0.4 kWh duration, frequency, and approximate time during the day a load
Computer 250 Watts 4h 1 kWh
Mobile charger 10 Watts 2h 0.02 kWh
profile was estimated. Fig. 11 shows the power generation of the
Radio 50 Watts 2h 0.1 kWh PV, wind, and hydro systems, the load profiles, and the charging
Total 4.67 kWh and discharging of a storage device for a typical day. It is obvious
from this figure that neither the hybrid PV-wind system in Thingan
nor the MHP in Kolkhop can satisfy the combined demand of the
two villages. However, hybridizing the two power plants into a sin-
30 gle mini-grid increases the reliability of the power supply and sat-
isfies the demand. Additionally, this process ensures sufficient
Power (kW)
20
PV surplus power to charge the storage device during off-peak hours.
Wind
10 Hydro Fig. 12 shows the scope of the present research. A total of 53
Total Power
0
houses in Thingan and 120 houses in Kolkhop were provided with
2 4 6 8 10 12
Hours (Hr)
14 16 18 20 22 24 electricity. Houses are closer in Thingan than in Kolkhop. Fig. 12
(a) also shows the locations of the transformers and medium-voltage
40
Load (MV) and low-voltage (LV) transmission lines, and includes a scale
Total Power
Power (kW)
30
bar. The two villages are several years away from being able to
20
access the national grid.
10
0
2 4 6 8 10 12
Hours (Hr)
14 16 18 20 22 24 5. Conclusions
(b)
30
Surplus/ Charge Throughout our literature review, the authors have not found
20
any published reports demonstrating the implemented tri-hybrid
Power (kW)
10
0
renewable energy system comprised of PV, wind, and hydro
-10
systems intended to provide electricity for off-grid applications,
-20
Discharge
making this study the first of its kind. This work paves the way
2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24
Hours (Hr) for the development of similar rural electricity systems in other
(c) mountainous countries like Nepal, wherever there is significant
potential for all three of these RE sources.
Fig. 11. Simplified diagram showing (a) power generation from various sources, (b)
power generation and load profiles, and (c) charging and discharging profiles. A HRES is a relatively cost-effective solution in areas where the
national utility grid is expensive, and thus is suitable for power
applications in remote areas. Integrating distributed generating
and readings were taken daily by trained volunteers at 6 AM, 9 AM, systems in a mini-grid increases the reliability and quality of
12 noon, 3 PM, and 6 PM over a one-month period. Prior to the power. The paper introduced two hybridizing techniques for inte-
pilot study, clear rules were set in regard to electricity usage: grating PV, wind and hydro power into one mini grid. One of the
energy consumption per household was not to exceed 2.2 kWh technique was implemented to connect a hybrid PV–wind system
per month, and electricity was not to be used except for lighting to hydro dominant system via mini-grid connecting the Thingan
and the charging of cell phones. Electricity usage for other pur- and Kolkhop villages in Makawanpur District of Nepal. The results
poses were strictly limited during the one-month trial period, demonstrated that such systems can be hybridized by applying a
and the resulting village load profile was recorded. Fig. 10 presents hybrid charge controller, a GTI, and a suitable electronic load con-
the typical daily electricity consumption of a Thingan household troller (ELC). Such an approach may be extended to other off-grid
during the pilot study period, which shows that households tried systems.
to comply with the limited-use rules. However if these rules are The use and hybridization of available energy resources will
ignored, power demand is obvious to increase as majority of promote environmental sustainability by reducing the demand
Fig. 12. Comprehensive aerial view of the villages, showing a detailed distribution network.
242 B. Bhandari et al. / Applied Energy 133 (2014) 236–242
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