Training Module PHOTOVOLTAIC PROJECT ANALYSIS

SPEAKERS NOTES CLEAN ENERGY PROJECT ANALYSIS COURSE

This document provides a transcription of the oral presentation (Voice & Slides) for this training
module and it can be used as speaker's notes. The oral presentation includes a background of the
technology and provides an overview of the algorithms found in the RETScreen Model. The training

material is available free-of-charge at the RETScreen International Clean Energy Decision Support
Centre Website: www.retscreen.net.

SLIDE 1: Photovoltaic Project Analysis

This is the Photovoltaic Project Analysis Training Module

of the RETScreen International Clean Energy Project
Analysis Course. Here we discuss the operation and
application of photovoltaic energy systems, such as the
Slide 1
one located on the roof of this research laboratory in
Varennes, Quebec, Canada, and shown in this photo.

SLIDE 2: Objectives

This module has three objectives. These are first, to

review the basics of photovoltaic systems; second, to
illustrate key considerations for photovoltaic project
analysis; and third, to introduce the RETScreen
Photovoltaic Project Model. Slide 2

SLIDE 3: What do PV systems provide?

Photovoltaic systems provide electricity. A photovoltaic

module, such as the blue panel being mounted on the roof
in these photos, generates a small current when sunlight
strikes it. This current can be used to power isolated loads
or can be fed onto a grid, an interconnected web of Slide 3
generating stations and transmission facilities that
provides electric power to a number of distributed
consumers. In other words, PV can provide electricity to
devices as small and simple as hand-held calculators or to
networks as large and complex as the power system that
brings electricity to most homes in North America.
While photovoltaic modules generate direct current, or DC
power, a photovoltaic system will often include
components that convert this into the alternating current,
or AC power, that is required by many common
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SLIDE 3: What do PV systems provide? (cont.)

appliances. PV systems that are not connected to the grid will also typically include
battery storage, permitting the system to provide power at night and during cloudy
periods.
Photovoltaics can also provide power for water pumping. In many places, water needs to
be pumped from wells or sloughs, as a source of drinking water for people or livestock. If
the electricity grid is not nearby, photovoltaics can cost-effectively generate electricity for
a water pump. While an electric water pump is not fundamentally different from other
loads, such as lights and radios, photovoltaic water pumping is usually treated as a
separate class of PV system, mainly because the ultimate quantity of interest is water not
electricity.
Photovoltaic systems have a number of attributes that are as important to some people
as their ability to generate electricity or pump water. These attributes are all illustrated in
these photographs of a photovoltaic installation on a home in a part of West Bengal,
India, that is not served by the electric grid.
First, reliability: photovoltaic modules are one of the most reliable sources of electricity
ever developed. They contain no moving parts, and will function without human
intervention for decades. This is crucial in locations, such as West Bengal, where the
expertise and infrastructure needed to maintain complex power systems are not available
at a price the system owner is able to afford. Such locations are found not only in
developing countries: they exist around the world, and even in outer space satellites
and space probes were the original motivation for the development of photovoltaic
technology.
Second, simplicity: PV systems contain few components and have very basic operating
and maintenance procedures. This makes them well suited to the people in this village,
who probably lack the training and familiarity necessary to operate a fossil-fuel powered
generator.
Third, modularity: the power that a photovoltaic system provides, under given conditions
of sunshine, is largely dictated by the size and number of photovoltaic modules in the
system. Add more modules, and the system provides more power. This makes it easy to
scale the size of the system in response to changes in the demand for electricity or the
availability of capital. For example, if the household shown here plans to buy a television
in 5 years time, they will be able to upgrade their power system when the additional
demand arrives, and not be forced to find money now to pay for an unnecessarily large
system.
Fourth, image: few power systems captivate the imagination like photovoltaics. Its image
is high-tech and green in the developed world, and in the developing world PV may be a
token of modernity that diminishes the lure of the big city.
Fifth, silence: generating electricity in utter silence, a photovoltaic system is a godsend to
those many people who would otherwise have to live or work near a diesel or gasoline-
fired generator.

SLIDE 4: Components of PV Systems

While the building block of a photovoltaic system is the photovoltaic module, modules
themselves are composed of photovoltaic cells. These are thin, flat sheets or strips of
semiconductor that are sensitive to light: they convert a portion of the lights energy
directly into electricity. The semiconductor most commonly found in photovoltaic cells is
silicon, a plentiful element found in sand. Slide 4

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SLIDE 4: Components of PV Systems (cont.)

Under bright sunlight, a typical photovoltaic cell measuring 10 cm by 10 cm will generate

about 3 Amps of current at 0.5 V or about 1.5 Watts. This is a small amount of power. If
30 or so of these cells are connected in series, the output will be around 3 Amps at 15 V,
or almost 50 Watts, which is enough to power small loads. Such an assembly of cells,
encapsulated in a weather-proof envelope of glass and plastic, composes a photovoltaic
module.
When a single PV module is insufficient to supply the desired quantity of power, it can be
wired into an array consisting of multiple modules. The array is mounted on a structure
that orients it in such a way that it will catch a reasonable amount of sunlight. For
example, this structure may be a tilted roof that, in the Northern Hemisphere, faces south.
Because a PV module provides little electricity during overcast periods and no power at
night, off-grid photovoltaic systems generally must store excess power generated during
sunny periods. A battery or, in water pumping systems, a reservoir, fulfils this function.
About 90% of the batteries used in PV systems are of the lead-acid variety. While the
lead-acid battery is relatively cheap and common, it is not as long-lived as a photovoltaic
module and requires some maintenance, such as the replenishment of water lost during
use.
Photovoltaic systems may also include electronic power conditioners. These manipulate
the output of the array such that it matches the current and voltage requirements of the
load. Inverters are common power-conditioning devices that convert direct current into
alternating current. With an inverter, the PV system can operate common appliances
designed for grid power, such as standard washing machines and televisions, or feed its
power onto the grid itself. Charge controllers, another class of power conditioners, limit
the output of the array when it is charging a battery and the battery is full. Rectifiers
perform the opposite operation to inverters: they convert AC to DC. This allows the DC
loads and battery of a photovoltaic system to get additional power from an AC source,
such as the grid or a rotating generator. A DC-DC converter permits the array and the
load to operate at different voltages. This can be used to ensure that the array is
operated at the voltage that generates the maximum amount of power, or to boost the
current available to a motor or pump that is just starting up.
A photovoltaic array need not be the only power source in a PV system. A diesel,
propane, or gasoline-fueled generator, or genset, can furnish power when loads are
especially high or there is little sunshine. At mid-latitude locations, winds are often
strongest during the winter, precisely when sunshine is weakest. Thus, wind turbines and
photovoltaics can complement each other. Whenever two or more generating sources are
combined, a so-called hybrid system results.

SLIDE 5: On-Grid Systems

Lets divide photovoltaic systems into three distinct classes on-grid, off-grid, and water
pumping - and examine each of these in turn.
The grid, as mentioned in a previous slide, is a collection of geographically dispersed
consumers and generators all interconnected by electrical transmission and distribution Slide 5

lines. A photovoltaic array can be one of a large number of generators providing power to
a grid.

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SLIDE 5: On-Grid Systems (cont.)

Photovoltaics can be integrated into the grid at a central plant or distributed around many
locations on the grid. The centralized approach is familiar to utilities accustomed to
conventional coal, hydro, gas, and nuclear power plants. In general, this approach
facilitates system control, operation, and maintenance and leads to economies of scale. It
is questionable whether these advantages are significant for photovoltaic systems,
however, due to photovoltaics inherent modularity, simplicity, and reliability.
The distributed approach, though inappropriate for conventional power plants, is
applicable to photovoltaic systems. In its favour, it overcomes a major disadvantage of
centralized integration, in that distributed systems can be mounted on roofs and facades,
whereas the cost of a large tract of land for a central PV array can be very significant.
In distributed integration, the PV array will typically be located on a building. When the
sun shines, the PV-generated electricity will power some or all of the loads in the building.
This reduces the amount of electricity that the building owner must purchase from the
grid. Should the output of the array exceed the total load of the building, it is technically
possible to sell electricity back to the grid. Many utilities, though not all, permit this.
Photovoltaics can be integrated into either a central grid or an isolated grid. A central grid
is one that covers a vast geographical area, with thousands of generators and millions of
consumers. The North American electricity grid is one example. An isolated grid is a
smaller network of generation and distribution facilities, not interconnected with the
central grid, that supplies electricity to a limited area, such as a single remote community
or the communities on an island.
While there are a large number of on-grid photovoltaic systems installed around the
world, such systems are rarely competitive with conventional power plants, at least on a
cost basis, except when the PV system is in some way subsidised.

SLIDE 6: Off-Grid Systems

Now lets turn to the second class of PV system, which supplies power to a load that is
not connected to any grid.
Many small off-grid loads can be powered by a stand-alone PV system. These systems
may involve nothing more than a photovoltaic module connected to a battery and the Slide 6

load, though most will also include a charge controller. They are extremely reliable, since
there are so few components, no moving parts, and minimal electronics.
At higher latitudes, there will be less sunshine available during winter, and an array able
to provide power to a large load over the winter may be very costly. The larger the load
and the more pronounced the difference between the availability of sunshine in summer
and winter, the better the case for adding a fossil fuel-powered generator or a wind
turbine to make a hybrid system.
Unlike on-grid systems, off-grid systems are often very cost-effective compared to other
power sources. This is especially true when loads are small, perhaps 10 kW or less.
Extending the grid to an off-grid load has extremely high capital costs, even compared to
the high capital costs of PV systems. Small loads cannot justify the practically limitless
power available from the grid. Providing power solely with a genset or by non-
rechargeable batteries is initially inexpensive, but burdens the operator with high, on-
going fuel or battery replacement expenditures, frequent site visits, and genset
maintenance and overhaul. In the long run, these costs mount and make the more capital
intensive PV system attractive.

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SLIDE 7: Water Pumping Systems

This, the third class of PV system, is a special type of off-grid system. Its two
distinguishing characteristics are that there is usually just one load, the water pump, and
that a reservoir generally supplants the battery.
Different types of pumps are suited to different conditions of desired flow rate and head, Slide 7

or vertical distance that the water must be lifted. For head below 6 or 7 m, suction pumps,
which draw water upwards by creating a negative pressure, can be used. These pumps
need priming that is, they need to be filled with water before they can operate. For
higher heads, centrifugal or volumetric pumps must be used. Both of these types of
pumps must be located on or in the water source. Centrifugal pumps impart momentum
to the water by flinging it out the vanes of a spinning rotor, thus pressurizing the flow.
They work well when large volumes of water are required, but are sensitive to variations
in the head. For high or varying heads, especially when modest flows are required,
volumetric pumps can be used. These draw water into a chamber, close the inlet, and
then force the water up and out of the chamber. Then the outlet is closed and the cycle is
repeated. When the head is high and large flow rates are necessary, a multi-stage
centrifugal pump, which draws the water through a series of rotors one after the other, is
required.
The power conditioner is an important part of many pumping systems. Depending on
whether a DC or AC motor is used in the pump, the conditioner may be a DC-DC
converter or an inverter. The power conditioner helps the photovoltaic array provide the
high current that may be needed to start the pump, even under low sunlight conditions,
and operates the array at a voltage that generates maximum power, regardless of the
operating voltage of the pump motor. A battery can fix the voltage and provide starting
current, thereby replacing a DC-DC converter, but this introduces complexity,
maintenance, and inefficiency.
Like many off-grid applications of photovoltaics, water pumping can be very cost-
effective. In the developed world, it is used when water for livestock must be drawn from
a well or slough that is remote from the electric grid. It can also be used for the domestic
water supply of an off-grid home. In the developing world, its typical application is the
provision of water for a village.

SLIDE 8: Solar Resource

Compared with other energy sources, sunshine is fairly dilute: one must have a large
array to collect significant amounts of power. On the other hand, the solar resource is
more evenly dispersed over the globe than most other renewable energy resources, such
as wind and hydro. That is, there is a modest solar resource available everywhere, at Slide 8
least considered on an annual basis.
Lets examine what this means for photovoltaic systems. First, we need to introduce a bit
of terminology. The capacity of a photovoltaic array is rated in terms of its power output
under standard test conditions of bright sunshine and cool temperatures. The unit of
capacity is the peak Watt, which is written as a capital W with a subscript p. A 100 Wp
array, for example, will furnish about 100 Watts of power if squarely oriented towards the
sun at noon on a cool, clear spring day. When there is less sunshine, the array provides
less power, but it is still called a 100 Wp array.

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SLIDE 8: Solar Resource (cont.)

At the vast majority of locations on the planet, a peak Watt of installed photovoltaic
capacity oriented to catch the sun will generate between 800 and 2,000 Wh of energy per
year. The low end of this scale corresponds to a cloudy high-latitude site, such as found
along the northern coast of Norway. The upper end of the scale is representative of
Botswana or other particularly sunny countries in Africa. It is possible to find sites that fall
outside this range for example, on mountain ridges normally in cloud but they are
rare.
While the annual solar resource is relatively similar for most locations the world over, the
difference between the sunshine available in winter and summer becomes more
pronounced at points nearer the poles. This is especially problematic for off-grid systems
that must operate year-round. To increase the winter output of a fixed array, its tilt angle
measured with respect to the horizontal should be increased an angle equal to the
latitude of the site plus 15 is often used. For comparison, to generate maximum output
over the year, a tilt angle equal to or somewhat less than the latitude should be
employed. A more vertical array catches more sun during the winter, when the sun is low
in the sky.
Increasing the tilt angle makes only a limited improvement to the winter-time
performance, unfortunately, and winter loads at high latitudes may necessitate a hybrid
system with a genset.
Some arrays are mounted on racks that move throughout the day to keep the array
oriented towards the sun. So-called trackers can increase the output of the array by 20 to
50%. They are only effective, however, for direct sunlight, not diffuse light on cloudy days.
They do almost nothing to increase the winter output of arrays at high latitudes, since the
suns arc across the sky is very limited during this season. Furthermore, they add moving
parts and complexity to the photovoltaic system. Trackers may be cost-effective for high
summertime loads or on-grid applications where only the total solar energy collected over
the entire year is important.

SLIDE 9: Solar-Load Correlation

Solar energy varies on a seasonal basis as well as on a daily (or diurnal) cycle. When
sunny periods coincide with higher than average loads, and cloudy periods with low or no
load, an off-grid photovoltaic system requires less battery storage and operates more
efficiently. When planning an off-grid system, therefore, the solar-load correlation should Slide 9
be examined.
Some typical photovoltaic applications have a good solar-load correlation on a seasonal
basis. Two notable examples are cottages and irrigation. Both are used during the
summer, when the solar resource is good, and require little or no power during the winter.
Diurnal solar-load correlation can be positive, negative or zero. Positive correlation
occurs when power does not need to be stored in a battery in order to meet the load; this
photo of a photovoltaic water pumping system shows one example. Nighttime loads, such
as lights, exhibit negative solar-load correlation. Zero solar-load correlation arises when a
load requires the same amount of power, on average, regardless of whether or not it is
sunny. A telecom or monitoring station may be an example of this.

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SLIDE 10: Examples of PV System Costs

Photovoltaic system costs vary greatly depending on location and application. To convey
a sense of their costs, this slide compares two very different systems.
The first is an on-grid home in California, USA. It has a 1 kW roof-mounted array
connected to the grid by an inverter. For this system, the purchase of the array accounts Slide 10

for about 60% of the total cost of installing and operating the system over its entire
lifetime. The inverter is responsible for about 15% of the life-cycle cost, and installation
another 10%.
The second example is a remote 2.5 kW PV hybrid system powering telecommunications
equipment in southern Argentina. Here the single largest expense over the life of the
system is the purchase of batteries every 5 or so years. Fuel purchases for the genset
are the second most important cost. Purchasing, maintaining, and overhauling the genset
together make up the third most significant cost, mainly because the system is remote
and maintenance visits require expensive travel by highly-trained personnel. For similar
reasons, design and installation of the system at this remote site are expensive.
To summarize, battery and genset fuel and maintenance expenses dominate costs for
the remote off-grid system, while the on-grid house is characterised by high initial costs
and minimal long-run expenditures.
The two systems are also very different in terms of their performance and cost-
effectiveness. In sunny California, the grid tied house generates about 1.6 MWh per year,
whereas the PV array of the higher-latitude hybrid system generates only 2.5 MWh per
year, despite being two and a half times larger than the array on the house. The cost of
generating electricity is an expensive $0.35 per kWh for the California house and an
astronomical $2.70 per kWh for the hybrid system. But note: with grid electricity costing
$0.08 per kWh in California, the on-grid photovoltaic system is not cost-effective. In
contrast, the Argentinian off-grid system is far less expensive, on a life-cycle basis, than
the next cheapest power supply option of a genset-battery cycle charging system, which
generates electricity at about $4.00 per kWh.
This illustrates the point that while photovoltaic systems can be expensive, for off-grid
applications, they may be cheaper than all other alternatives.

SLIDE 11: Photovoltaic Project Considerations

A number of factors should be considered when developing a photovoltaic project. As

pointed out in previous slides, photovoltaics are cost-effective off-grid but uncompetitive
on-grid. Thus, the cost-effectiveness of photovoltaics at an off-grid site may hinge on an
evaluation of the barriers to extending the grid to the site. If the load is small and the grid Slide 11
far away, such as is the case for this telecommunications site in a remote area of
northern Canada, PV will likely be far more cost-effective than grid-extension. If the grid is
near within a few kilometers and the load large more than a few kW, photovoltaics
will have more difficulty competing with grid extension.

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SLIDE 11: Photovoltaic Project Considerations (cont.)

When sites are remote or difficult to access, the cost of visiting the site to bring in fuel or
perform operation and maintenance tends to be high. This makes genset and primary
battery systems less attractive than photovoltaic systems, which require less
maintenance and benefit from automatic delivery of free fuel whenever the sun is shining.
Photovoltaic systems have high initial costs and low operating expenses; in contrast,
many competing power sources, such as gensets, are initially inexpensive but have high
on-going costs. It is critical, therefore, that operation and maintenance costs, and not just
initial capital costs, be included in any comparison of different power systems.
While PV systems rarely break, they may fail to provide power if there is a longer than
normal period of especially overcast weather. Larger arrays and batteries decrease the
risk of such failure, but raise the cost of the system. This results in an inherent trade-off
between cost and reliability. During planning stages, the required level of reliability should
be determined. A telecom system such as the one in this photo will demand very high
reliability, and be costly as a result.
When an off-grid photovoltaic system is to provide power to homes, cottages, or villages,
it is essential that the systems users have realistic expectations about what the system
can provide. Furthermore, when photovoltaic systems are proposed for developing areas,
the social impacts of the system should be anticipated.
Lastly, intangible benefits of the photovoltaic system are often more important than costs.
The high-tech image of the technology, its environmental benefits, its minimal noise and
visual pollution compared to gensets and electric lines, and its modularity and simplicity
may make it the power system of choice even when cheaper options exist.

SLIDE 12: Solar Light and Home PV Systems

Examples: Tibet, Botswana, Swaziland, and Kenya

About 2 billion people around the world are not served by any electrical system. Most live
in developing countries, usually in rural areas with little infrastructure and far from the
grid. Many desire electricity to replace candles and oil lanterns with more convenient
electric lighting, and to watch television and listen to radios without the continual need to Slide 12
replace or recharge batteries. The draw of the so-called modern, industrial life-style is
strong, and using electricity is one prominent characteristic of this life-style.
The grid may never extend to all communities and homes: the capital is not presently
available for such an expensive program. Where it does reach remote areas, the grid can
be weak and unreliable. One way to provide electricity to areas poorly served by the grid
is to use photovoltaics. The PV system can power a single rechargeable portable lantern,
seen here at bottom left, or all the loads of a home. In either case, the electricity
consumption tends to be very small a few hundred watt hours per day so a
correspondingly small photovoltaic system can be used.
The PV system, unlike wind turbines or gensets, is simple, very reliable, and can be
maintained by people who have no background in power systems. This is key in areas
where there may be no local expertise to install or operate the system.

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SLIDE 12: Solar Light and Home PV Systems

Examples: Tibet, Botswana, Swaziland, and Kenya (cont.)

The photo at the top left shows a batik used in Kenya to help communicate basic
information about what photovoltaics are and what they can provide. To its right are two
photos of solar home systems, the top one from Tibet and the bottom one from
Swaziland. Note that they use only one module for each home. The fourth photograph
shows housing for staff at a medical clinic in Botswana. With a solar water heater and a
photovoltaic system providing electricity, the home has some of the conveniences of the
city, making it easier to attract trained medical personnel to this rural area.

SLIDE 13: Remote Cottages and Homes

Examples: Finland and Canada

In some developed countries, many city people spend their summer at a cottage in the
countryside. Some people flee the city entirely, and choose to live year-round in an out-
of-the-way home. The grid does not serve many of these cottages and remote homes,
and photovoltaics have been very widely used to power their loads. PVs modularity Slide 13
permits the owners to start with a small system and add capacity over the years, in
response to changing loads or availability of funds. It is a simple technology that cottage-
goers and homeowners can operate, maintain, and even install themselves. And having
fled from the city, these people are pleased by the absence of genset noise and ugly
power lines.
Cottages, which tend to be used predominantly in the summer, have good seasonal solar
load correlation. Homes occupied year-round will often employ a hybrid system.
In the photo on the top left, two modules mounted on the porch roof are sufficient to
power the loads in this Finnish cottage. Each of Norway, Finland, and Sweden have tens
of thousands of cottages with photovoltaic systems. The photo on the right shows a park
wardens residence on the western coast of British Columbia, Canada. The wardens,
whose mandate is to preserve the environment and provide a natural environment free of
noise and visual pollution, are very enthusiastic about PV. In the photo at bottom we see
a remote home in Yukon Territory, Canada. The home, occupied year-round, has a large
array as part of its hybrid system

SLIDE 14: Hybrid Village Power Systems

Examples: Morocco and Brazil

A previous slide showed how photovoltaics could provide power for lighting and individual
homes in the developing world. Another approach to electrifying remote rural areas is to
build a mini-grid for the village and use a photovoltaic hybrid system to power this grid.
This has several advantages: it makes electricity available to a larger group of people and
Slide 14
it permits generation and storage capacity to be used more efficiently.
Extending the grid to remote villages is often prohibitively costly. Transporting fuel to the
site for a genset may be very expensive, and fraught with the dangers of fuel spills and
contamination. Using a photovoltaic-genset hybrid system requires less fuel to be
transported to the village. Usually such a system will also contain battery storage.

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SLIDE 14: Hybrid Village Power Systems

Examples: Morocco and Brazil (cont.)

Human aspects are a key part of the planning and execution of these projects. It is
essential that the systems users have realistic expectations about what the system can
provide. They must understand that it does not offer the virtually limitless electricity of the
grid, and that high power loads such as irons and electric heaters will consume all the
electricity that the system can furnish and then some. They must recognize the
consequences of adding new loads that were never envisioned during the design of the
system. They must be informed that repeatedly emptying the battery of charge without
letting it recharge will have detrimental effects on its lifetime, so that they can practice
restraint. When realistic expectations are implanted prior to the installation of the system,
people will be more satisfied with its performance.
The system must also include some mechanism to ration the electricity among the
different system users, so that one user does not consume all leaving the others with
nothing. Such a mechanism should encourage use at times when the battery is full and
the sunshine is strong, and discourage use when there is little energy available. Some
people advocate imposing absolute limits on each subscribers use of capacity and
energy. Whatever the system, it should include safeguards to prevent theft of the
electricity by unmetered loads.
The social impacts of the system must not be neglected. Negative impacts may include
the imposition of a heavy debt load to pay for the high initial costs of the system and an
exaggeration of the differences between rich and poor in the same neighbourhood.
Positive impacts may include greater satisfaction with living conditions in remote areas
thus stemming the tide of migration to large cities and making it easier to attract educated
city people to work in health care or education. Finding the most equitable and
reasonable way to finance and pay for the system is often a more complicated and
important exercise than the design of the system itself.
The photo on the left of this slide shows the students of a rural college in Morocco
standing in front of the array of their hybrid power system. The photo on the right shows
the array of a power system for an isolated village in the Amazon of Brazil.

SLIDE 15: Industrial System: Telecom & Monitoring

Examples: Antarctica and Canada

Photovoltaics power thousands of off-grid industrial loads the world over. PVs high
reliability makes it ideally suited to critical loads such as telecommunications equipment
and monitoring systems.
Many of these loads are very remote. In the top photo, we see a hybrid system in Slide 15

Antarctica, thousands of kilometres from the nearest grid, powering a seismic monitoring
station. At such remote locations, the cost of transporting fuel to the site may be several
times the purchase price of the fuel itself. When there is a problem or maintenance is
required, expensive, trained personnel may need to be flown to the site by helicopter.
This makes photovoltaics, which reduce fuel and maintenance requirements, very
attractive.

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SLIDE 15: Industrial System: Telecom & Monitoring

Examples: Antarctica and Canada (cont.)

In general, the characteristics of gensets are the opposite of those of photovoltaics, and
this makes them complementary power sources. Gensets have low capital costs but high
operation and maintenance costs. By combining the two in the same system, a smaller
PV array can be used, curbing capital costs, at the same time that fuel consumption is
decreased, lightening the burden of O&M.
An industrial application need not be thousands of kilometres from the grid for
photovoltaics to make sense. The bottom photo shows a PV system powering the
monitoring, control, and telecommunications equipment at a natural gas well-head in
Alberta, Canada. There are thousands of these systems in this area, and many are
located right next to power lines. A PV system avoids the cost of the transformer required
for grid hook-up, is more reliable than the grid, which would require an uninterruptible
power supply, and can be relocated should the well be moved. The PV system is a
standard package that meets the needs of the well-head regardless of its distance from
the grid.

SLIDE 16: On-Grid Buildings with PV

Examples: Switzerland and Japan

On-grid photovoltaics are rarely cost-effective without subsidies. Still, there are thousands
of photovoltaic systems installed on grid-served buildings. Lets examine why.
For many installations, a subsidy is a secondary consideration. Rather, people make
decisions based on the image that their PV system would project, the environmental Slide 16

benefits it brings, or the long-term reduction in prices that a market stimulus will have.
PV, generating electricity out of something as ethereal as sunshine, is a space-age
technology closely related to the semiconductors that power our computers. To a
company in, for example, Japan, photovoltaics may be a bold but sophisticated way to
promote their high-tech, futuristic, and green image.
Photovoltaics generate electricity without pollution, and their manufacturing process is
quite clean. The energy used in their manufacture is generated twenty times over during
their useful lifetime. People who feel a strong commitment to the environment may decide
that minimizing their global impact is more important than having the least-cost power
source. For them, a PV system is a matter of principle.
Some governments recognize the long-term promise of photovoltaics to provide energy
without pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. In order to encourage the research and
development necessary to reduce costs in the future, some governments are willing to
subsidize todays markets for photovoltaics. Such subsidy programs have been
successful in bringing down the cost of on-grid photovoltaics to a fraction of what it was
only 20 years ago, and prices are continually being driven down. Utility, government, and
manufacturer subsidy programs have worked best when they have made a long-term
commitment to the technology: this gives research and development enough time to have
an impact and encourages investment in larger, more efficient manufacturing facilities.
In the top photo of this slide we see residential roofs in Switzerland that are covered in
photovoltaic roofing material. In the bottom photo an office building in Japan has
photovoltaics integrated into its glass curtain wall.

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SLIDE 17: Water Pumping PV Systems

Examples: India and USA

Photovoltaic water pumping is often cost-effective off-grid. Especially in agricultural

applications, the need for water often coincides with sunshine, such as hot periods or
summertime. A reservoir can store water for cloudy periods or night-time use and is more
reliable and robust than a battery. Slide 17

Water pumping can lead to major improvements in water quality. For example, a livestock
watering system that obviates the need for the cows to enter into a slough to drink will
reduce contamination of their water supply. This will be reflected in the better health of
the livestock.
For low-flow applications, the fuel saved by switching from a fossil fuel-powered pump to
PV is not significant. But being able to put a PV pump in place and then having it run
automatically is much more convenient than periodically transporting a fossil fuel-
powered pump to the site. This is a major selling point for many farmers and ranchers.
The reliability and simplicity of photovoltaics as a source of power for pumping is
extremely important for water supplies to homes or developing-world villages. It may be
too expensive to bring trained personnel to these sites to operate and maintain more
complex or failure-prone power systems.
The photos on this slide show a livestock watering system in the USA and a village water
supply in India, both powered by photovoltaics. The Indian arrays are mounted on a solar
tracker which follow the position of the sun in the sky.

SLIDE 18: RETScreen Photovoltaic Project Model

The RETScreen Photovoltaic Project Model is a simple but very useful tool for a
preliminary investigation of the technical and financial feasibility of a photovoltaic project.
For an installation anywhere in the world, it can provide an analysis of the energy
projection, life-cycle costs, and greenhouse gas emission reductions. The installation can Slide 18
be an on-grid system connected to a central or an isolated grid, an off-grid system with or
without a generator, or a water pumping system.
To conduct this analysis, the user provides the sites monthly average temperature and
monthly average daily solar radiation on a horizontal surface. The software includes a
large database of solar radiation and temperature data from around the world. These
monthly data are much easier to obtain and manipulate than the 8,760 values needed for
an hour-by-hour simulation.
While the RETScreen Photovoltaic Project Model provides a lot of key information about
the system, it does not calculate the loss-of-load probability, a measure of the systems
reliability. It also does not model concentrator systems, which use reflective surfaces or a
lens to boost the intensity of the sunlight falling on a photovoltaic device.

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 Photovoltaic Project Analysis Training Module

SLIDE 19: RETScreen PV Energy Calculation

The RETScreen PV Energy calculation determines the performance of the PV system

over the period of a year, using monthly solar radiation and temperature data. Here we
provide an overview of this calculation; for more information, see the RETScreen
Engineering and Cases Textbook, available on-line and free-of-charge. Slide 19

The first step in the calculation is the conversion of the monthly radiation data for a
horizontal surface into the monthly radiation data in the plane of the array. RETScreens
algorithms are able to perform this calculation for fixed or tracking arrays. The resulting
data for radiation in the plane of the array are then used to determine the electrical
energy produced by the array each month.
For the on-grid model, the output of the array must be reduced by the losses in the
inverter. For isolated grids with much PV capacity compared to the loads on the grid,
there may be times when the grid cannot use all the power provided by the PV system;
the useful output of the array has to be reduced to account for this.
For off-grid systems, RETScreen must determine what portion of the arrays output is
used directly by the load, and what portion is stored in the battery for later use. The latter
portion suffers losses due to battery inefficiencies. For hybrid systems, RETScreen then
calculates the demand that cannot be met by the photovoltaic array, and must therefore
be met by the genset.
For water pumping systems, the efficiency of the motor and the pump is used to calculate
the fraction of the arrays energy that actually lifts water. This is then converted into a
quantity of water pumped through the specified head.
The outcome of these steps is a calculation of the energy actually delivered to the load.

SLIDE 20: Example Validation of the RETScreen PV Project Model

The RETScreen software has been validated in a number of ways. For example,
RETScreen has been compared with the National Renewable Energy Laboratorys
HOMER simulation tool, which uses hourly solar insolation data. In particular, an off-grid
PV/battery/genset system in Argentina was examined. The system powers a 500 W AC Slide 20
load and consists of a 1 kW array, a 60 kWh battery, a 7.5 kW genset, and a 1 kW
inverter.
On an annual basis, the two tools agreed to within a few percent for their predictions of
PV array energy production and genset fuel consumption. For all months considered
individually, the two tools agreed to within about 10%. This suggests that RETScreen can
be as accurate as hourly simulation, and is sufficiently accurate for pre-feasibility
purposes.

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SLIDE 21: Conclusions

Photovoltaics can feed electricity to the grid, power off-grid loads, or be used for water
pumping. Solar energy is available everywhere on the planet, and PV systems are
already being used in every climate imaginable.
The capital costs of PV systems are high, but their operating and maintenance costs are Slide 21

very low. PV is typically cost-effective when grid power is not available, especially if the
load is small. On-grid installations of photovoltaics are generally not yet cost-effective and
are often subsidised. Existing on and off-grid markets for photovoltaics have led to rapidly
declining costs.
The RETScreen software calculates energy production using monthly solar radiation data
but achieves an accuracy comparable to simulations based on hourly data. RETScreen
can significantly reduce the cost of conducting preliminary feasibility studies of
photovoltaic projects.

SLIDE 22: Questions?

This is the end of the Photovoltaic Project Analysis Training Module in the RETScreen
International Clean Energy Project Analysis Course.

Slide 22

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