Techno-Economic Feasibility Analysis of a Hybrid Energy System for The Community of Albreda and Jufureh

Abstract

A large number of rural communities in The Gambia are deprived of the basic access to a sufficient and reliable supply of electricity. Among them are those that have no access to it at all. Due to the lack of proximity of these communities to the grid, as well as their relatively low electricity consumption, it is not cost-effective to connect such communities to the only available grid network. Another major issue is the lack of the capacity to supply the electrical loads of the country. These and other factors like high fuel prices makes it necessary to deploy off-grid hybrid renewable energy systems (HRES) for electricity generation in such locations. In this paper, the Hybrid Optimization Model for Electric Renewable (HOMER) is used to model a most suitable hybrid electrical power plant to feed an electrical load of 1,795 kWh/day for the two neighboring villages of Albreda and Jufureh in the North Bank Region of The Gambia. This communities receives a daily average global solar radiation of 5.22 kWh/m2 /day and records an annual average wind speed of 4.3 m/s. The optimized system is found to be a PV-Wind-Diesel Generator-Battery system which has a renewable fraction of 0.93, an initial capital of $1,771,640 and a Total Net Present Cost (NPC) of $2,368,156 at a fuel price of $1.13/Liter. The levelized Cost of Energy (COE) is $0.406/kWh. This value is higher than the current domestic tariff of the grid electricity provider, which is $0.210/kWh. However, for a community with no access to grid electricity, this is a suitable solution. The system is built to provide an adequate and reliable electricity supply to the community for a 25-year period. It also provides an emission reduction of 91.6% compared to a conventional generator-only system. It produces an excess electricity of 323,323 kWh/h. The unmet electric load and capacity shortage are 12.4 kWh/yr and 133 kWh/yr respectively which are both approximately 0% of the total energy produced.