Techno-economic performance and feasibility of biomass energy system: Tunisian case study

Rural electrification by the main grid entails large investments and losses. For this, the use of a decentralized energy system such as biomass is very interesting. The main objective of this article is to assess the technico-economic performance of the biomass energy electrical system designed for the electrification of a remote rural area by presenting a Tunisian residential case study located in a north-eastern region. Thus, a mathematical programming model has been developed, whose input is the different economic costs of electricity generation, to determine the optimal radius to grow, thereby reducing the cost of megawatthours and thus maximizing the PI profit index. The economic efficiency of the biomass energy system is proven by results under operating conditions specified in the study such as the number of consumers and the price of the biomass energy system indicated by Is. The preliminary study of the energy consumption in the case study makes it possible to highlight the impact of energy consumption and the specific investment Is on the profit index PI. Also, the best electricity production and the corresponding specific investment are determined by technical and economic research to ensure a reasonable price per MWh. This proves that a single specific investment specified Is = 1, 200, 000$ making it possible to obtain a positive PI profit index provided that the price per MWh will be 55$/MWh.