Techno-economics of solar wind hybrid system in Indian context: A case study

Continuous electricity supply for people in remote areas has always presented a problem, where central grid electricity supply to all consumers is economically not feasible in our country. The government of India has kept the target for power to all by 2012. As per the recent data available (March- 2005) out of 5,87,556 total villages only 4,74,982 village have been electrified (% electrification is 81%). This situation still leaves 1,12,374 villages and about 80 million households without electricity. Out of above un-electrified villages, 25000 villages will have considerable infrastructure problems to connect with utility grid. The alternate source of electricity is small diesel driven alternators. Renewable energy technologies based on wind, solar and supported by L.P.G/diesel/kerosene based generators is one of the options. To meet energy requirement of such a customer, hybrid standalone system be a one of the viable solution for remote villages where grid is not available. The cost of hybrid system based on renewable technology is high. The other problem related to renewable energy technology is reliability. There is a need to design cost effective hybrid stand alone system in few kW range for residential purpose based on small wind generator, SPV and LPG based gas generator for urban areas and kerosene/diesel based system with wind and SPV for remote villages. The proposed system with moderate cost can become the viable solution with good reliability. Objective of this paper is to optimize the initial cost and optimum utilization of available sources and reliable power supply to consumers in Indian scenario.