System performance in microgrids based hybrid PV systems

Retrofitting existing diesel based microgrids to integrate renewable energy resources is of significant interest to microgrid developers. There are many technical challenges in the integration of renewable energy resources in the context of microgrid. Among the numerous issues associated with micro-grids, system operation considering spinning reserve management should be properly studied to allow a better understanding of the system performance and potential savings due to renewable energy integrations at planning stages. This paper presents the system performance study of the integration of a photovoltaic (PV) system in a diesel generation based microgrid. The impacts of solar PV system considering spinning reserve requirements are studied. Realistic data from a 20 MW mining project is used as a case study to perform analysis. The results show the feasibility and benefit of the hybrid PV system.