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PROJECT TOPIC:  DESIGN AND CONSTRUCTION OF 1 MEGA WATT SOLAR ENERGY SYSTEM
Department:  Electrical Electronics
AMOUNT:  10,000
FORMAT:   MS WORD
PAGES:  70
 
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ABSTRACT

This study aims at design and construction of 1mw solar energy system.A prefeasibility study of renewable energy projects including grid-connected solar PV systems was conducted using RETScreen software, designed by Natural Resources Canada and used for. An extensive literature review of solar PV systems with a special focus on gridconnected systems was conducted after which the procedure for the design of institutional large-scale grid connected solar PV systems was developed. The developed procedure was used in the design of a 1 Megawatt (MW) grid-connected solar PV system for Niger Delta University. The performance of the system was simulated using RETScreen Clean Energy Project Analysis software and the results analysed. The analyses of the simulation results show that the project is socially beneficial to the community, in this case the university, with an annual energy yield of about 1,159 Megawatt hour (MWh) which is about 12% of Niger delta university annual electricity consumption. The process of electricity generation from solar PV saves about 792 tonnes of CO2. The yield factor, performance ratio and capacity factor were other technical performance parameters considered. Under the prevailing tariff conditions in the country, the project yields a very large negative net present value (NPV) and a simple payback period of about 50 years. These parameters, however, improve when higher feed-in tariffs, grants and capital subsidies are introduced into the simulation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 Background to the study

Energy demand in the pre-industrial world was provided mostly by man and animal power and to a limited extent from the burning of wood for heating, cooking and smelting of metals. The discovery of abundant coal, and the concurrent technological advances and its use, propelled the industrial revolution. Steam engines, mechanized production and improved transportation, all fuelled directly by coal, rapidly followed (Neelakantan, et al., 2011). But for so many years, the world energy sources depend on conventional sources such as fossil fuel, hydro, coal, radioactive decay, etc. But all these have their peculiar problems of scarcity, rapidly depleting, causing pollution, greenhouse effect and harmful to both man and other living organisms in the environment. Global climate change is a change in the long-term weather patterns, in view of this, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate reported that by the year 2050 earth surface’s temperature will rise by 28 oC while the amount of CO2 emissions must have reduced by 85% .This could occur due to a significant change in the number of natural climate events or, as well, by a number of human induced climate events. The increased awareness of the environmental impact, the carbon trail of all energy sources, and electric power production, have given stimulus to the growth and adopting of renewable as an alternative energy. Of which solar might cost more than its counterpart renewable energy sources (RES) but is preferred more than others due its abundant in nature. RES such as solar, wind, and tidal were considered as the solution to the aforementioned problems. For the fact that renewable energy sources are clean, pollution-free, harmless, recyclable, distributed throughout the earth and inexhaustible that makes it a better substitute. Moreover, global climatic change, world-wide increase in energy demand, uncertainty in price and availability of non-renewable energy and world energy policies on using environmental friendly source of energy have made PV systems suitable for energy generation in recent time. Consequently, the feed-in tariffs policies adopted by many countries, especially in Europe, have supported the spread of photovoltaic (PV) energy resources. Although, PV cells still show some technological limitations in terms of efficiency in power output, thus more research work requiring significant improvements in the exploitation of PV systems were still going on . Nigeria is not left out in such policy, by signing the Electricity Power Reform Act into law in 2005, provided impetus for long term investment and turn-around in the electricity sector, with improved generation and stable power supply delivery. A significant component of the law is the provision made for investment in renewable energy and in off-grid electricity generation to boost rural access to electricity and meet the needs of about 70% of the country’s rural communities. But unfortunately, the policy did not see the light of the day. But even as at that, many private sectors and individuals have embarked upon stand-alone PV power as a remedy for frequent power failures in Nigeria

Human civilisation faces major challenges to meet its growing requirement for energy. Renewable energy is the fastest growing energy sector, driven by four key factors: increasing energy demand due to population growth and standard of living improvements, the need to diversify energy supplies in view of resource scarcity, the need to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to prevent climate change and the need to reduce the balance of payments impact of fossil fuel imports. Solar photovoltaic electricity generation (PV) as a renewable energy technology offers reliable indigenous energy production with low embodied carbon emissions. Solar PV should not be seen as a panacea that will solve the world’s energy needs on its own, but it has the potential to make a crucial contribution alongside other renewable energy sources as part of a mix of low carbon energy sources. Solar energy generation is intermittent since it varies with solar elevation, declination, and cloud cover. There is a strong correlation between solar energy generation and commercial energy use, since the peak of solar energy output is in the middle of typical business opening hours in most regions. Installation of grid-connected solar photovoltaic systems is fundamentally simple, consisting only of a number of solar panels (modules) connected to an inverter that is itself connected to a building’s electrical distribution via switchgear and energy (kWh) metering. Despite this apparent simplicity, designing a system which is safe, regulation compliant and economically optimal system is very complex and not always well executed. To accurately predict the performance of a solar PV system is also a complex task, requiring a large number of interrelated algorithms including those for solar geometry, spectral effects, solar cell properties and inverter efficiency. Each of these sub-models has an implicit uncertainty in its calculation. In addition, the sub-models require external data including historic weather data and module and inverter performance parameters from datasheets. This input data also has an uncertainty. The resulting uncertainty in modelled energy and financial yield causes a financial risk for system owners, which increases the cost of capital and ultimately the levelised cost of energy.

Whatever the motive for installing solar PV, the primary technical objective remains the same: to minimise the cost of generating each unit of electricity within ethical and environmental constraints. Achieving this optimisation of the cost per unit of electricity or Levelised Cost of Energy (LCOE) can be achieved either by reducing the capital cost or increasing the energy yield. In reality, minimising LCOE requires careful optimisation of each design parameter to compromise between minimum capital cost, maintenance cost and maximum energy yield, within the confines of the project. This thesis describes a project to improve on the design processes used for solar photovoltaic (PV) Systems, so their potential for large scale clean energy generation can be realised.

            Solar radiation is the most important parameter to be considered when installing PV or CSP systems. Therefore, it is necessary to assess solar resources by analyzing and forecasting the spatiotemporal distribution of solar irradiance. Wang et al. 2014 proposed an improved deep learning model based on discrete wavelet transformation (DWT), convolutional neural network (CNN), and long short-term memory (LSTM) for day-ahead solar irradiance forecasting. In the case study which used two datasets from the Elizabeth City State University and Desert Rock Station in the United States the performance of the proposed model, named DWT–CNN–LSTM, was compared with six other solar irradiance forecasting models. The results showed that DWT–CNN–LSTM is highly superior for solar irradiance forecasting, especially under extreme weather conditions. Analyzing sky dynamics by processing a set of images of the sky dome is a new trend for solar resource assessment.  World is rapidly moving towards generating Electrical energy from Solar PV system and Scientists are developing solar resources with better technology to maximize energy production as much as possible. One of the prominent models of such a technology is the grid-connected PV system which supplies electricity directly to the power grid  The designer of the system is responsible for selecting the value of the different parameters: number and type of PV modules, inverter type, distribution of components in the installation field, etc.

1.2 Statement of problem

            With growing concerns about greenhouse gas emissions, the security of conventional energy supplies, and the environmental safety of conventional energy production techniques, renewable energy systems are becoming increasingly important and are receiving much political attention. Photovoltaic (PV) and concentrated solar power (CSP) systems for the conversion of solar energy into electricity are in particular technologically robust, scalable, and geographically dispersed, and they possess enormous potential as sustainable energy sources. Despite the advances in PV and CSP systems, inappropriate planning and design could impede the extensive penetration of solar energy. Systematic planning and design considering various factors and constraints are necessary to deploy PV and CSP systems successfully.

The energy generated in Nigeria is grossly inadequate, hence the need to improve structures on ground, and also introduce alternative energy technologies (i.e. renewables) to complement current government efforts to provide sustainable energy for the citizens (Federal Ministry of Environment, 2013). Nigeria’s present electricity supply is highly insufficient and epileptic; a situation which has led to individuals corporate and government organizations making alternative arrangements to provide electric power for their installations using various generators with a wide range of power capacity. No doubt, this has increased the cost of production and by direct consequence supports inflation and a lower standard of living of Nigerian Citizens. The additional cost these installed generators bring with their usage is that of environmental degradation which has become a major concern in our world today. Thinking “renewables” is therefore a general approach that has been identified to fill in this energy shortage without degrading our environment.Renewable energy is no doubt the way out for Nigeria, looking at her dwindling oil reserve and the consequent green house effect of the burning of fossil fuels within her territory. Nigeria is currently experiencing a tough time in its energy sector. Presently, incessant power supply is the order of the day. The power Holding Company of Nigeria cannot guarantee a full-day uninterrupted power supply to Nigerians, reasons being that the present conventional energy sources are operating below their installed capacity. Due to the numerous disadvantages of conventional fuel sources when compared with solar energy and the recent giant strides in improving solar cell efficiency using a photovoltaic (PV) device that converts 40.8% of light that hits it into electricity, Nigeria needs to reposition herself by investing in this invaluable resource to secure the energy future of our economy.

 

 

 

1.3 Aims and objective of the study

The main aim of this study is to design and construction of 1mw solar energy system.

Its specific objectives are :

1. To investigate the various renewable   energy potential available   for sustainable energy generation in Nigeria.

2. The numerous issues involved in harnessing solar energy in Nigeria

3. To design a construction an efficient 1mw solar energy system

3. To identify aspects of the design process which could be improved upon to enable designers to optimize the financial yield of solar PV systems.

4. To improve the accuracy of energy yield modeling for PV systems. This improvement in the model accuracy will reduce the financial risk of investment and therefore the cost of capital investment.

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