Impact of Energy Management on a Solar Photovoltaic Microgrid

Abstract

bigger percentage of known primary sources of energy is fossil fuel. The energy consumption is rapidly increasing all over the world but their real sources generally remain limited. As the world fossil fuel production rate stands, many major producer countries will deplete their oil fields within a decade calling for some other alternative sources of energy production. Investing in renewable energy resources as an alternative to fossil fuel burning has been on the rise with solar photovoltaic taking the lead in supplying a clean environmentally friendly renewable energy resource using solar photovoltaic technology. Fossil fuel burning also causes global warming and consequent destruction of ozone layer. This paper presents the impact of energy management on a solar photovoltaic microgrid. Literature related to solar photo-microgrid reviewed from various researchers, mathematical modeling, energy management, and weather forecast of the microgrid studied. Furthermore, the economic and environmental impact of installing the solar PV system to supplement the utility grid electricity studied. The microgrid modeling done in MATLAB/Simulink software, hardware components assembled and Arduino Uno used to implement the energy management system in real-time. The weather forecast that led to estimation of future solar power production done using both PVsyst and Application Programming Interface (API) software for medium term and short term planning respectively. The economic analysis of the proposed solar PV system show that the initial cost of investing in the solar PV system is US$ 384, the payback period estimated at 11 years while the overall saving gained by switching from the utility grid electricity to solar PV system for 25 years estimated at US$ 486. The energy management achieved through switching between the PV based microgrid and the utility grid electricity is able to reduce 1,333.78 kg of CO2 emissions during the 25 years of the project life.