Economic analysis of hybrid energy system for rural electrification using HOMER

Hybrid Power System (HPS) is a combination of different renewable resources such as wind, solar, biomass, hydrogen fuel, hydro, with fossil fuel powered diesel generator to provide electric power. The objective of this work is to propose a methodology for designing a stand-alone hybrid PV/wind/diesel/battery system minimizing the Cost of Energy (COE) and the CO
₂
emission using HOMER (Hybrid Optimization of Multiple Electric Renewables) for a rural village Perumal Kovilpathy, Tamil Nadu. The capital cost, cost of energy, Net Present Cost (NPC) for different types of resources are determined from the load demand and optimized configuration of hybrid system are obtained. The analysis results show that, among three hybrid systems for supplying electrical requirements, the most economical is the PV - diesel - battery hybrid system, which has a total net present cost of US$271,637 and a cost of energy of US$0.23/kWh. The action plan is formed on the basis of cost effective modeling that is minimization of energy production cost in a near future. The amount of CO
₂
Emissions Reduction is calculated to be 242 tonnes of CO
₂
/yr and US$3140/yr earnedfrom the Carbon Credit.