Techno‐economic study and optimal sizing of a stand‐alonernphotovoltaic water pumping system

摘要

Solar energy is effectively used to power stand‐alone photovoltaic pumping systemsrn(PVPSs) for irrigation and drinking purposes in remote areas. However, randomrnvicissitudes and the unpredictability of the amount of solar energy that can bernharnessed lead to difficulties in designing PVPS. Thus, an optimal sizing approachrnis essential to ensure satisfactory performance. In this paper, a numerical iterativernsizing approach based on technical and economic objectives is developed tornoptimize the configuraion of PVPS. The loss of load probability criteria is consideredrnas the technical objective, while the life cycle cost criteria is considered asrnthe economic objective. The proposed pumping system provides a daily water forrna small village in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The proposed sizing approach is usedrnto test all the possible configurations of a wide range of photovoltaic (PV) arrayrnsizes to specify the PV array configurations that realize the reliability condition.rnThe optimal size of the storage tank and the optimal number of PV modulesrnconnected in series and parallel are specified to keep up a balance between the loss of load probability, life cycle cost, and excess water volume of PVPS. Thernperformance of the system is tested on the basis of the proposed optimal configurationrnand hourly meteorological data for 1 year. The results show that the proposedrnsystem is available throughout most of the year.