Evaluation of different operating strategies in small stand-alone power systems

This paper presents a sequential simulation technique to evaluate different operating strategies for small stand alone power systems (SSAPS) using wind and/or solar energy as well as storage facilities. Four types of operating strategies for SSAPS are discussed and evaluated. These are continuous diesel operation without storage, continuous diesel operation with storage, intermittent back-up diesel operation without storage and intermittent back-up diesel operation with storage. The advantage and disadvantage of these strategies are analyzed with reference to reliability, diesel fuel savings, back-up diesel average start-stop cycles and average running time etc. The probability distributions associated with these parameters are also constructed and analyzed.