Selection of a planning horizon for a hybrid microgrid using simulated wind forecasts

Hybrid microgrids containing renewable energy sources represent a promising option for organizations wishing to reduce costs while increasing energy security and islanding time. A prime example of such an organization is the U.S. military, which often operates in isolated areas and whose reliance on a fragile commercial electric grid is seen as a security risk. However, incorporating renewable sources into a microgrid is difficult due to their typically intermittent and unpredictable nature. We use simulation techniques to investigate the performance of a hypothetical hybrid microgrid containing both wind turbines and fossil fuel based power sources. Our simulation model produces realistic weather forecast scenarios, which we use to exercise our optimization model and predict optimal grid performance. We perform a sensitivity analysis and find that for day-ahead planning, longer planning horizons are superior to shorter planning horizons, but this improvement diminishes as the length of the planning horizon increases.