Solar Potential Assessment Using PVSYST

Software
C.P. Kandasamy P. Prabu K.Niruba
Assistant Professor, Assistant Professor, Assistant Professor,
Department of EEE, Department of EEE, Department of EEE ,
V.S.B Engineering College, V.S.B Engineering College, V.S.B Engineering College,
Karur, Tamilnadu, India-639 111. Karur, Tamilnadu, India-639 111. Karur, Tamilnadu, India-639 111.
[email protected] [email protected] [email protected]

Abstract— Electricity is an essential part of our way of life. Most no interaction with a utility grid, the generated power is directly
of the electricity is currently provided from the conventional connected to the load. In case the PV array does not directly
thermal or hydro power stations. With the growing concern about supply a load, a storage device is needed [1]. Mostly this is a
the greenhouse gas emission and other environmental issues the
battery, the battery bank stores energy when the power supplied
renewable energy technologies such as photovoltaic cells are
increasingly being recommended for electricity production. In this by the PV modules exceeds load demand and releases it backs
paper, the simulation of a grid-connected solar photovoltaic system when the PV supply is insufficient. This standalone PV power
is presented with the use of the computer software package PVsyst generation will be used in the home for the electrification
and their performance was evaluated. The performance ratio and purpose [2]. A wide variety of tools exist for the analysis and
the various types of power losses (temperature, internal network, dimensioning of both Grid connected and stand-alone
power electronics) are calculated. From the results, the viability of
photovoltaic systems. System designers and installers use
installing 1 MW solar photo voltaic (PV) power plant is discussed
by comparing solar energy production and life cycle cost of some of simpler tools for sizing the PV system.Mostly scientists and
the places in southern region of Tamilnadu. engineers typically use more involved simulation tools for
optimization. Software tools related to photovoltaic systems can
Index Terms— Electricity, Grid connected solar PV system, be classified into pre-feasibility analysis, sizing, and simulation.
Photovoltaic cells, PVsyst software, Tamilnadu. PVsyst is a dedicated PC software package for PV systems. The
software was developed by the University of Geneva. It
integrates pre-feasibility, sizing and simulation support for PV
systems. After defined the location and loads, the user selects
I. INTRODUCTION
the different components from a product database and the
software automatically calculates the size of the system. The
A photovoltaic (PV) system consists of a PV array, battery solar data at 0.5° latitude and longitude resolution are available
and elements for power conditioning. The PV system converts in PVsyst Software [3, 4]. Financial analysis can also be
solar energy into dc power. If ac loads are used means, the performed. Economic feasibility and viability of implementing
system requires inverter to convert dc into ac. There are two PV solar energy in the State of Kuwait was found that the
types in PV system such as grid connected and standalone. Grid- energy resources used in producing traditional electricity was
connected photovoltaic systems feed electricity directly to the saved and the cost of CO2 emissions was also saved [5]. In this
electrical network, operating parallel to the conventional energy work, the simulations are performed by using PVsyst 5.59. By
source. Grid-connected systems generate clean electricity near comparing the energy production, performance ratio, efficiency
the point of use, without the transmission and distribution losses and cost, the optimal location for installing 1MW grid connected
or the need for the batteries.Its performance depends on the local solar PV power plant in the southern region of Tamilnadu are
climate, orientation and inclination of the PV array, and inverter discussed. The graphs and tables that will depict in the later
performance. Whereas, a stand-alone system involves portion of the paper had been generated while doing the
simulation.

978-1-4673-6126-2/13/$31.00 2013
c IEEE 667

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 II. GEOGRAPHICAL CONDITIONS OF SOUTHERN
TAMILNADU
TABLE I
GEOGRAPHICAL DETAILS
Sl.No.
Place Latitude Longitude Altitude
1. Madurai 9.930 N 78.120 E 101
2. Sivagangai 9.430N 78.490E 102
3. Sivakasi 9.450N 77.820E 101
4. Tuticorin 8.780N 78.130E 4

Table I depicts the geographical conditions of 4 locations are

to be considered. The above details are to be given as input to
get the solar irradiation for the respective places.
Fig 2. Orientation

III. GRID CONNECTED SOLAR PV SYSTEM

IV. SYSTEM DEFINING PARAMETERS
1 MW grid connected solar PV power plant is installing by The following are the details about the Grid connected PV
compare the energy production, economic feasibility of some of systems for Tuticorin site.
the places in southern region of Tamilnadu such as Madurai,
Sivagangai, Sivakasi and Tuticorin using PVsyst Software. A. System Specification
Figure 1 shows the proposed model of the grid connected PV TABLE II
SYSTEM SPECIFICATIONS
system. The following tables, figures are given for Tuticorin site
only. Module type Standard
Technology Mono-Crystalline

Table II depicts the details about the system specification.

Here, the standard module type is used. Mono-Crystalline PV
technology is used for all the locations.
B. Defined PV array
TABLE III
DEFINITION OF PV ARRAY

Nominal Power 1000 KWp

Load Profile Grid

Fig.1. Grid connected PV system

Fig 2 shows the inclination and orientation for the solar panel Table III represents the definition of PV array. The
for Tuticorin site. The tilt angle for PV array is kept as equal to nominal power is 1000KWp and the load profile is grid
the latitude of the corresponding location to get maximum solar
connected system.
irradiation [6, 7]. So that the optimum tilt angle for Tuticorin
(8.780) site is kept as 90.

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C. Global System Summary

TABLE IV E. Operating Conditions

GLOBAL SYSTEM SUMMARY
TABLE VII
No. of Modules
4446 OPERATING CONDITIONS

Module Area Vmpp(400C) 344 V

6536m2
Vmpp(270C) 365 V
No. of Inverters
4
Voc(120C) 470 V
Nominal PV Power 1000 KWp Plane
1000W/m2
Irradiance
Maximum PV Power 1067 KWdc Impp (STC) 2762 A
Isc (STC) 2970 A
Nominal AC Power 1000 KWac Max.operating
998 KWp
power
Array nominal
Table IV depicts the global system summary. Number of power
1000
modules required for 1 MW solar PV plant is 4446. The area
requirement for installing grid connected plant is 6536 m2. Four
Table VII represents the operating conditions of the Grid
number of inverter is required.
connected PV system.
D. Homogeneous System
1) PV Module V. PERFORMANCE ANALYSIS

TABLE V This research work is totally based on the PVSYST software.

PV MODULE We have used this software for modeling purpose. All the
figures, tables are depicted here in the paper are generated
PV
225 Wp, 23 V during the simulation process for Tuticorin site only. As this
Module
paper represents the computational modeling so we just present
Vmpp(40 the simulation results only rather than the description.
0 26.4V
C)
TABLE VIII
Voc(120C) 36.2V ENERGY INJECTED INTO THE GRID

2) Inverter

TABLE VI
INVERTER

Inverter 250 KW, 320-550 V, 50Hz

0
Vmpp(40 C) 26.4V
0
Voc(12 C) 36.2V

Table V depicts the details about the PV module used in this

system. Table VI shows the details of the inverter used in this
system.

Table VIII shows that the energy uses of the Tuticorin site. It
depicts the monthly average energy injected into the grid in
kWh. The maximum energy injected into the grid at the month

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of March as 154091 kWh. The minimum energy injected into Table X depicts the meteorological and incident energy of the
the grid at the month of November as 102217 kWh. The total PV system. The global horizontal irradiation (GlobHor) is
energy injected into the grid is 1522909 kWh/year. 2034.1 kWh/m2/year. The horizontal diffuse irradiation
(DiffHor) is 794.82 kWh/m2. The overall global incident energy
on the collector plane is 2032.4 kWh/m2.
TABLE IX
NORMALIZED PERFORMANCE COEFFICIENTS TABLE XI.
DETAILED SYSTEM LOSSES

Performance ratio (PR) is the ratio of the final PV system

yield (Yf) and the reference yield (Yr) [8].
Table XI depicts the detailed monthly average system losses
Yf
PR= in kWh. Module quality loss ( Mod Qual) is 882.64 kWh/year.
Yr Module mismatch loss (Mis Loss) is 35280 kWh/year. Ohmic
Table IX depicts the performance ratio of Grid connected wiring loss (Ohm Loss) is 14814 kWh/ year. Array virtual
system for Tuticorin site. The yearly average performance ratio energy at Maximum Power Point (MPP), EArrMPP is 1617977
is 0.749. kWh/Year. Total Inverter loss is 95068 kWh/year.

TABLE X TABLE XII

METEO AND INCIDENT ENERGY BALANCES AND MAIN RESULTS

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 Table XII depicts the balances and main results of Grid Fig. 4 represents incident energy in the collector plane. The
connected PV system. Yearly global horizontal irradiation is global incident energy is 2032 kWh/m2. Beam incident in
2034.1 kWh/m2. The yearly global incident energy on the collector plane is 1239 kWh/m2.
collector plane is 2032.4 kWh/m2. Energy available at the output
of the PV array is 1565883 kWh. The energy injected into the
grid is 1522909 kWh. The EffArrR is the efficiency of the PV
array/rough area and the yearly average efficiency is 11.79 %.
The yearly average efficiency of the system is 11.46 %. The
average ambient temperature is 26.86 0C.

Fig. 5 Transposition Factor

Fig. 5 represents the transposition factor. Transposition factor

is the ratio of the global incident energy on the collector plane to
the horizontal global irradiation. Transposition factor for
Tuticorin site is 0.9992.

Fig 3. Performance ratio

Fig. 3 represents the Performance Ratio of the Incident energy

for the entire month of the year graphically. The average
Performance ratio is 0.7491.

Fig. 4 Incident energy

Fig.6 System loss diagram.

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 Fig. 6 represents the overall system loss diagram for Tuticorin maximum solar irradiation is achieved at a tilt angle of 9 0 (for
site. The horizontal global irradiation is 2034kWh/m2.The Tuticorin) which is nearly equal to the latitude of that location
effective irradiation on the collector plane is 1969kWh/m2.So (8.780) and no shading effect is considered. For 1MW Grid
the loss in energy is 3.2%.Then the PV cell convert solar energy connected solar PV system, the energy production is maximum
into electrical energy. After PV conversion, array nominal in Tuticorin (1523 MWh/Year) as compared to other locations
energy is 2001MWh.The efficiency of PV array is 15.55% at such as Madurai (1414 MWh/year), Sivagangai (1335
Standard Test Condition (STC). Array virtual energy obtained is MWh/year) and Sivakasi (1398 MWh/year).The economic
1618MWh.After the inverter loss, the available energy at the feasibility of installing PV plant in Tuticorin is better as
inverter output is 1523MWh. So the energy injected into the grid compared with other places. The total investment for installing
is 1523MWh. power plant in Tuticorin is Rs.10.8 crores without considering
the land cost. This is almost equal to the total investment of the
VI. SOLAR POTENTIAL ASSESSMENT FOR other location. The energy cost is Rs.6.35/unit which is
VARIOUS SITES comparatively less than the other locations.
TABLE XIII
SOLAR POTENTIAL ASSESSMENT FOR VARIOUS SITES
REFERENCES

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[2] Husnain-Al-Bustam, Md.Zakaria Mahbub, M. M. Shuvro
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India is taken into account for the lifetime of 25 years. The

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