Environmental and economic analysis for grid-connected hybrid photovoltaic-wind power system in a hot arid environment

This paper deals with the environmental and economic benefits of hybrid renewable energy (HRE) system in a hot arid environment. This paper focuses on small-scale operations of 100kWh per day energy generation of HRE system as grid-assisted power generation in conjunction with solar (photovoltaic) and wind energy components. A comparison is drawn between a grid-connected HRE system operation and a standard grid operation in focusing on environmental and economic impacts. Emissions and the renewable energy generation fraction (RF) of total energy consumption are calculated as the main environmental indicator. Costs including net present cost (NPC) and cost of energy (COE) are calculated for economic evaluation. To simulate long-term continuous implementation of the HRE system, the hourly mean global solar radiation and wind speed data of 2007, from Alice Spring (23.70°S,133.88°E) of Australia, are used as an example of a typical hot arid climate. The HRE system is implemented at a monthly solar exposure between 13.31 and 21.3 (MJ/m^2 )/day and mean wind speed of 7.0 m⁄s.The Micropower Optimization Model software HOMER by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory is used. It is found, for Alice Spring’s arid climates, the optimum results of HRE system show a 64.4% reduction of emissions including CO_2, NO_x and SO_2. The optimum renewable fraction (RF) is 58%. It also has benefits of cost saving. The reduced COE is only equal to about 81.7% of energy consumption from standard grid. In addition, through a set of sensitivity analysis, it is also found that the wind speed has more effects on the environmental and economic performance of a HRE system under the specific climate.