Battery energy storage cost and capacity optimization for university research center

Microgrids (MGs) are the essential part of the modern power grids defined as the building blocks of smart grids. Renewable Energy Sources (RESs) and Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESSs) combined with Distributed Generators (DGs) form a comprehensive MG, which require the control and Energy Management System (EMS) to fulfill the load and grid requirements. As the need for BESS grows due to uncertainties of RESs, scheduling and cost management of BESSs in the MG becomes more of a concern. In this paper, BESSs have been designed for a university research center to simultaneously overcome the outage problem and shave the peak demand considering the BESS sizing and degradation; MG cost minimization, as well as MG scheduling. PV and wind are the RESs employed in this study and in combination; Li-Ion BESS has been utilized to investigate the MG performance. A two-layer optimization algorithm has been presented to optimally define the BESS size and minimize the operational cost of the MG achieving the peak shaving and valley filling objectives. The results prove the functionality and applicability of the proposed system to be implemented as a part of the experimental MG at Griffith University in order to enhance the stability and reliability of the research center and at the same time minimize the operational costs of the MG.