Techno-Economic Evaluation of a Hybrid Energy System for an Educational Institution: A Case Study

Abstract

This study evaluates the technical, economic and environmental benefits of renewable energy resources (RER) for electricity supply to large size buildings in an educational institution. The cost of energy generation coupled with the epileptic power supply has led to the demand for an alternative source of energy supply to an education institution in Nigeria. The essence of renewable energy generation is becoming more glaring and a hybrid energy system (HES) is believed to deliver efficient and sustainable energy for the institutions; this paper aims to analyse the techno-economic assessment of a HES design setup at the College of Engineering, Afe Babalola University Ado-Ekiti for powering the university buildings; this grid connected system was assessed with various system configurations was simulated using hybrid optimization model for electric renewables (HOMER) software and the levelized cost of energy (LCOE) with the consideration of the HES benefits was developed. The results obtained from the simulation indicate that the grid and solar Photovoltaic (PV) system provide an optimal system that adequately meets the load demand with more renewable energy integration and this significantly reduces the cost of energy by 45% and also causes a 32.09% reduction in CO2 emissions; this configuration is environmentally sustainable and financially suitable for electrifying an educational institution.