Diesel Plant Sizing and Performance Analysis of a Remote Wind-Diesel Microgrid

This paper introduces an energy-flow model developed for performance analysis and unit sizing of an autonomous wind-diesel microgrid. A remote community in Canada is used as the study system, for which a medium penetration wind power plant has been integrated into a system served by a diesel plant with three equally sized diesel generators. Based on field observations and monitored data for almost two years of operation, an energy-flow model is developed which incorporates operating constraints and control requirements of the autonomous wind- diesel system. The model is employed to analyze the interaction of wind and diesel power plants in order to identify alternative unit sizing approaches that improve wind-energy absorption rate of the wind plant, fuel savings and overall efficiency of the diesel plant. Optimization criteria for unit sizing of the diesel plant in the presence of the wind farm are discussed and system performance for several configurations based on multiple units with reduced-size diesel unit are investigated. The simulation results from the energy-flow model for two operation scenarios are compared with the field observations and an optimum combination of multiple diesels with reduced-size units is suggested.