How Hybridization of Energy Storage Technologies Can Provide Additional Flexibility and Competitiveness to Microgrids in the Context of Developing Countries

Abstract

Hybrid microgrids, integrating renewable energy sources and energy storage, are key in extending energy access in the remote areas of developing countries, in a sustainably way and in providing a good quality of service. Their extensive development faces a financing gap, having a high capital expenditure (CAPEX) also due to high storage costs. In the present work, a case study of a Ugandan microgrid was used to compare various battery technologies employed on their own and in a combination with a flywheel, in terms of their durability and the overall levelized cost of energy (LCOE) of the plant. Simulations show how hybrid storage configurations result in a lower LCOE for the current load profile of the microgrid and even more so for two reference residential and industrial load scenarios, suggesting this would remain the best solution even accounting for future socio-economic development. The resulting LCOE for hybrid storage configurations is lower than the average values reported for microgrid projects and represents a promising solution to speed up the development of such electrification initiatives.

Scaling-up Sustainable Energy Storage in Developing Countries

“…The second category of results sets out a research and development agenda organized along these challenges, and grouped into four research tracks. These findings represent a synthesis of the ideas identified through the literature review-many of which motivated by ideas laid out in [27] and [28] Table 2. Attributes of sustainable energy storage technologies.…”

“…However, given the novel interest in stationary energy storage in developing countries-outside of minigrid and island applications (e.g., Micangeli et al 2017 [24], Ericson et al 2017 [25], USAID [26], and Barelli et al 2019 [27])-there is relatively little information publicly available that is focused on this topic with some notable recent exceptions. These include, for example Few et al 2018 and 2019 [28,29] who provide many valuable observations and insights about the challenges facing the use of energy storage in developing countries and emerging markets and how they might be addressed; while IRENA (2019) [30] documents a number of renewable projects in developing countries, some of which use energy storage; and Vivid Economics and Faraday Institution (2019) [31] highlight the role of storage in off-grid applications to increase access to The literature review informed the identification of existing knowledge gaps, and the preparation of a set of questions (Table 1) Interviews also included a number of technology specific questions focusing on storage sizing, storage duration, degradation, toxicity, recyclability, operability, availability of materials and technology risks.…”

Advances in Phytochemistry, Textile and Renewable Energy Research for Industrial Growth

“…Kitobo Island constitutes one of the 84 islands of Ssese archipelago where fishing is the predominant economic activity. Commissioned in 2016, this solar MG provides electricity to over 600 rural households through 880 PV panels each with nominal power of 260Wp which are backed up by an 80kVA diesel genset (Barelli et al, 2019). This solar -diesel hybrid powered system is a typical off-grid type and comprises of off-grid inverters whose frequency modulation is characteristic of its loads (ERA, 2019).…”

Energy Storage on a Distribution Network for Self-Consumption of Wind Energy and Market Value

“…Using a price quote given at a time for an analysis invalidates any result from the analysis in a new economic setting. Taking into cognizance the high likelihood of changes in the prices of some of the storage technologies and with a broad study of the inconsistencies in price quotes from literature and industry-for example, consider the different prices specified for the same storage technology plus notes on cost inconsistencies in [14,19,[22][23][24][25][26][27][28][29][30][31][32]-the most likely cost range for each of the storage technologies is heuristically selected for analysis.…”