Determining the optimal parameters of a hybrid microgrid for supplying the University of Kirkuk in Iraq

The gap between the electrical power demand and the available power supply keeps widening in Iraq due to the occurrence of reduction of natural gas supply. That causes repeated power outages in many districts in the country. Adding to that sustainability issue, the problem of emission of greenhouse gases that boost climate change is the most common. Worldwide now. Combining renewable energy sources (RES) with energy storage can play the role of a feasible alternative to fossil fuel-based energy sources. Many studies in the literature presented the design, optimization, and evaluation of the feasibility of grid-connected microgrid systems technically and economically. However, there is still a clear gap in knowledge that might void the obtained results of all this conducted research in the case of power outage conditions. This study aims to determine the optimum system parameters and component sizing to consider what to do in power outage conditions. This guarantees a feasible solution technically, economically, and environmentally at the time of normality and when the grid goes down. Finding a solution to fill this gap, this research utilizes the merits of the Homor Pro software, engineering its design parameters, creating smart search spaces to design a microgrid composed of PV, battery energy storage, and diesel generator to supply the load demand of the University of Kirkuk in Iraq. The aim is to calculate the optimum size of each energy system component to find the most profitable solution, zero unmet demand, and the minimum CO2 emission at normal and outage conditions. To achieve that, the designed system used real-time meteorological data from the university site to find out the optimum parameters to realize the technical and economical optimization.