Governments and utility organizations around the world have mandated and provided incentives for new distributed renewable energy generation (DREG) capacity, and market projections indicate strong growth in distributed renewable energy generation installations in the coming years. New distributed renewable energy generation utilities, by definition, will be primarily located in built environments near consumers; these utilities are often planned and designed by landscape architects, yet no evidence-based, distributed renewable energy generation research is explicitly done by landscape architects or recognizes the role landscape architects play in planning and designing these spaces. The research and analysis provided by this study indicates that distributed renewable energy generation lacks a strong foundation as an independent concept which could benefit from clear broad phraseology linked to organized sub-terms/phrases for specific forms of DREG, that there has been some research done on topics familiar to landscape architects, that more needs to be done to meet important research questions and recommendations already posed, and that landscape architects are positioned to contribute to future distributed renewable energy generation research.

In the pursuit of a cleaner and sustainable environment, solar photovoltaic (PV) power has been established as the fastest growing alternative energy source in the world. This extremely fast growth is brought about, mainly, by government policies and support mechanisms world-wide. Solar PV technology that was once limited to specialized applications and considered very expensive, with low efficiency, is becoming more efficient and affordable. Solar PV promises to be a major contributor of the future global energy mix due to its minimal running costs, zero emissions and steadily declining module and inverter costs. With the expanding practice of managing decentralized power systems around the world, the role of private investors is increasing. Thus, the perspective of all stakeholders in the power system, including private investors, has to be considered in the optimal planning of the grid. An abundance of literature is available to address the central planning authority’s perspective; however, optimal planning from an investor’s perspective is not widely available. Therefore, this thesis focuses on private investors’ perspective. An optimization model and techniques to facilitate a prospective investor to arrive at an optimal investment plan in large-scale solar PV generation projects are proposed and discussed in this thesis. The optimal set of decisions includes the location, sizing and time of investment that yields the highest profit. The mathematical model considers various relevant issues associated with PV projects such as location-specific solar radiation levels, detailed investment costs representation, and an approximate representation of the transmission system. A detailed case study considering the investment in large-scale solar PV projects in Ontario, Canada, is presented and discussed, demonstrating the practical application and usefulness of the proposed methodology and tools.

In the pursuit of a cleaner and sustainable environment, solar photovoltaic (PV) power has been established as the fastest growing alternative energy source in the world. This extremely fast growth is brought about, mainly, by government policies and support mechanisms world-wide. Solar PV technology that was once limited to specialized applications and considered very expensive, with low efficiency, is becoming more efficient and affordable. Solar PV promises to be a major contributor of the future global energy mix due to its minimal running costs, zero emissions and steadily declining module and inverter costs. With the expanding practice of managing decentralized power systems around the world, the role of private investors is increasing. Thus, the perspective of all stakeholders in the power system, including private investors, has to be considered in the optimal planning of the grid. An abundance of literature is available to address the central planning authority’s perspective; however, optimal planning from an investor’s perspective is not widely available. Therefore, this thesis focuses on private investors’ perspective. An optimization model and techniques to facilitate a prospective investor to arrive at an optimal investment plan in large-scale solar PV generation projects are proposed and discussed in this thesis. The optimal set of decisions includes the location, sizing and time of investment that yields the highest profit. The mathematical model considers various relevant issues associated with PV projects such as location-specific solar radiation levels, detailed investment costs representation, and an approximate representation of the transmission system. A detailed case study considering the investment in large-scale solar PV projects in Ontario, Canada, is presented and discussed, demonstrating the practical application and usefulness of the proposed methodology and tools.

Background. At the year of 2021, 770 million people worldwide were living without access to electricity. In parallel with this, electrification of vehicles and other equipment constantly increases which results in a demand for access to reliable off-grid energy to allow for operation in remote locations or places without sufficient energy infrastructure due to external factors such as natural disasters. As the use of fossil fuels is predicted to decrease, the need for sustainable energy production utilizing renewable energy sources has proved to be critical. The combination of these factors results in a need for the development of sustainable off-grid energy systems utilizing renewable energy sources.  Objectives. The objective of this thesis is to highlight needs and present a developed solution to portable off-grid energy production and distribution utilizing renewable energy sources. The goal is to highlight problems within the area of focus and present a potential solution to one, or multiple, of these problems. The presented solution shall be based on a solid engineering foundation and meet the technical requirements developed from needs that arise during the project. Methods. The work presented in this thesis was conducted with the use of DRM, Design Research Methodology, as the choice of research methodology while Design thinking was the choice of design approach. The use of DRM allowed for a structured and efficient research process that allowed for the possibility to validate result. The use of Design thinking as design approach provided methods and tools to support innovation while working with problems that were initially unknown or vaguely defined. Results. The result of the work presented in this thesis provides information regarding multiple problems and critical aspects within the area of focus. A list of requirements for a sustainable energy system to satisfy in order to enter the market is presented, where portability, reliability and redundancy are marked as key requirements. A proposed solution in the form of a portable modular sustainable energy production trailer utilizing different renewable energy sources was developed to allow for off-grid electricity generation. This combined with an energy distribution solution in the form of a energy storage module mounted on the Volvo TA15 system allows for autonomous energy transportation to the location of the energy need.  Conclusions. As the need for sustainable energy constantly increases, development of sustainable energy production and distribution systems that can operate off-grid has proven to be critical. The utilization of renewable energy sources has also been identified as a critical factor in parallel with the phasing out of fossil fuels. The proposed solution has provided evidence of the potential for a portable off-grid hybrid energy system and its potential impact on the global 2030-agenda goals for sustainability.

[pt] A recente expansão das fontes renováveis para geração de energia elétrica decorre do encarecimento dos combustíveis fósseis e da preocupação com impactos ambientais e mudanças climáticas, assim como de avanços tecnológicos e da queda de seus custos de implantação. Entretanto, a natureza intermitente e sazonal dos recursos naturais, como vento e irradiação solar, pode afetar a operação do sistema elétrico. Uma alternativa para dar equilíbrio à carga do sistema, proporcionando ainda outros benefícios, é o armazenamento de energia. Uma tecnologia de larga escala para armazenamento é a de bombeamento hidráulico por meio de usinas hidrelétricas reversíveis (UHR), que oferecem mais eficiência, tempo de resposta mais rápido e vida útil mais longa que outras alternativas. Tendo em vista as lacunas teóricas no campo acadêmico, a dissertação propõe um modelo para identificação de locais potenciais para implantação dessas usinas, com o auxílio de ferramentas de sistema de informação geográfica e de formulações matemáticas que consideram critérios fisiográficos, energéticos, econômicos e socioambientais. Partindo de uma abordagem baseada no conceito de geomorphons combinada com soluções de um problema de otimização, o modelo proposto tem por objetivo definir uma formulação que busque minimizar os custos de construção de uma UHR. A demonstração da aplicabilidade do modelo é feita em torno do reservatório da UHE Sobradinho, e os resultados são discutidos a partir da comparação dos locais selecionados e dos custos obtidos. Pode-se concluir que é possível identificar potenciais locais para implantação de UHR a partir desse modelo, o que pode beneficiar agentes de planejamento do setor elétrico, bem como empresas que estejam interessadas em investir nesta tecnologia. / [en] The expansion of the use of renewable sources for electricity generation in recent years is a result of the increase of fossil fuels costs and the growing concern with climate change and the impacts on the environment, as well as technological advances and the reduction in their implementation costs. However, the availability of some natural resources for renewable energy matrices, such as wind and solar irradiation, has an intermittent and seasonal nature, which may affect the electrical system operation (CANALES et al., 2015; KELMAN & HARRISON, 2019). One of the alternatives to balance the system load is energy storage, which offers benefits to the electricity provision (ancillary services, for example) and regulates the frequency in times of high demand with low energy supply from renewables, contributing with the necessary inertia so that demand does not change instantly (BARBOUR et al., 2016). The most widely large-scale technology used for storage in the world is hydraulic pumping through pumped storage hydropower – PSH (GUITTET et al., 2016; IHA, 2018). Compared to other technologies, it provides a solution with high efficiency, faster response time and longer useful life (REHMAN et al., 2015). The operation of the plants is characterized by the pumping of water from a lower reservoir for its accumulation in an upper reservoir for energy generation in periods of high demand (BARBOUR et al., 2016). Energy storage alternatives are already on the agenda in the Brazilian energy sector as an option to ensure the system development in an economic and sustainable manner. In the 2030 Ten-Year Energy Expansion Plan (EPE, 2021b), PSH is highlighted as one of the resources to expand the offer for rush hour demand response. EPE understands that preliminary studies are an important step to support the sector s planning and guide the definition of regulatory aspects, which do not yet exist, related to the systemic benefits of this type of solution.