Energy is critical to the economic growth and social development of any country. Indigenous energy resources need to be developed to the optimum level to minimize dependence on imported fuels, subject to resolving economic, environmental and social constraints. This led to a boost in research and development as well as investment in renewable energy industry in search of ways to meet energy demand and to reduce dependency on fossil fuels. Wind and solar energy are becoming popular owing to abundance, availability and ease of harnessing for electrical power generation. This thesis focuses on an integrated hybrid renewable energy system consisting of wind and solar energy. Sri Lanka, a small island located south of the Indian subcontinent, has been blessed with renewable energy sources. According to the national energy policy a 10% share is targeted from NCRE (Non-Conventional Renewable Energy) sources by 2015 and 20% by 2020 out of total electricity generation in Sri Lanka. This thesis provides an insight into the energy scenario and present situation of renewable energy development in Sri Lanka. According to wind and solar potential maps of Sri Lanka which were developed by NREL in 2003, many parts of the country have potential to developed economic power generation. Through these maps locations were identified where both wind and solar potential is high. A detailed study was carried out in these locations with real time field data. The focal point of this thesis is to propose and evaluate a wind-solar hybrid power generation system for a selected location. Grid tied power generation systems make use of solar PV or wind turbines to produce electricity and supply the load by connecting to grid. In this study, HOMER (Hybrid Optimization Model for Electric Renewables) computer modeling software was used to model the power system, its physical behavior and its life cycle cost. The hybrid power system was designed for Hambantota District in Southern Sri Lanka. Through the simulation process, installation of 8 numbers of 850kW wind turbines and 1MW solar PV modules were identified as most economical to supply average of 3MW load connected to grid where the simple payback period of the system was 3.4 years.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:kth-179398 |
| Date | January 2015 |
| Creators | Udayakanthi, Geetha |
| Publisher | KTH, Kraft- och värmeteknologi |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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