Study of the Effects of Seasonal Climate Variations on Hybrid Power Systems Using Power Pinch Analysis

The role of renewable energy (RE) resources as clean alternatives to fossil fuel in power generation has been increasing. Widespread deployment of RE sources in Hybrid Power Systems (HPS) however can be a challenging task due to the stochastic nature of RE. Solar and wind are intermittent with weather variations, and the end use demands are also climate dependant. In this paper, Power Pinch Analysis (PoPA) method is applied to assess the different RE generation and load profiles from two seasonal climates namely winter and summer. The minimum electricity targets established from PoPA allows the designer to visualise the feasible limits for the sizing of HPS. Results show that HPS operation during winter demands a substantial amount of outsourced electricity, while summer operation requires higher investment on the PV generator and storage. (C) 2016 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.