Use of Clean Energy Resources for the Electrification of Remote Areas of Thar and Cholistan, Pakistan /

Abstract

Pakistan is an energy deficient country with limited energy reserves and high energy demand across the country and most of the oil is importing. But due to the excessive population growth, domestic and commercial energy sectors are consuming more and more energy every day. To meet that much energy demand it is very hard to rely upon the conventional energy resources, one must go towards renewable energy resources. In this research, we are designing a hybrid system using clean energy resources like PV, Wind and Biomass for remote area electrification in which some of the villages from Cholistan and Thar are considered. These areas are seen at a long distance from the utility grid and have low load factor and disperse population that makes grid extension less economical. Supplying these areas with diesel generators would be more expensive. No doubt, renewable energy resources have high capital cost as compared to nonrenewable resources but they have very less running cost and high rate of return. And it was seen in the long run they are more economical for the entire life of project. Due to the limited information available, it was considered obligatory to conduct a survey for the load demand of the local communities. More than sixty houses were visited and then all communities load was calculated. Other than PV and wind, biomass is also considered which is locally available in the form of animal dung. Cost of energy generated, net present cost, GHG emissions, excess energy and unmet load are recorded for different sensitivity cases depending upon the resource availability and variations in the prices of components and changes in the environmental conditions. Solar and wind energy resource data is recorded from NASA, and NREL database. Prices of the components are taken from local distributors. Techno-economic feasibility of the hybrid system is tested and recorded which approach would be beneficial for future either to go for clean energy based micro-grid or to make grid extensions to these rural areas. It was seen for all proposed locations that COE is found to be less than Rs. 14.40 per unit of energy for the most feasible hybrid combination, which is comparable to the local grid tariff and economical.