A Techno-Economic Model for Wind Energy Costs Analysis for Low Wind Speed Areas

Abstract

The global population is moving away from fossil fuel technologies due to their many disadvantages, such as air pollution, greenhouse gases emission, global warming, acid rain, health problems, and high costs. These disadvantages make fossil fuels unsustainable. As a result, renewable energy is becoming more attractive due to its steadily decreasing costs. Harnessing renewable energy promises to meet the present energy demands of the African continent. The enormous renewable energy potential available across the African continent remains largely untapped, especially for wind energy. However, marginal and fair wind speeds and power densities characterize African wind energy resulting in low and unsustainable power in many areas. This research develops a techno-economic model for wind energy cost analysis for a novel, Ferris wheel-based wind turbine. The model is used to techno-economically analyze the siting of wind turbine sites in low wind speed areas on the African continent. The wind turbine’s technical performance is characterized by calculating the annual energy production and the capacity factor using the wind Weibull probability distribution of the cities and theoretical power curve of the wind turbine. Its economic performance is evaluated using annualized financial return on investment, simple payback period, and levelized cost of electricity. The techno-economic model is validated for 21 African cities and shows that the Ferris wheel-based design is very competitive with four current, commercial wind turbines, as well as with other sources of energy. Hence, the new wind turbine may help provide the economical, clean, renewable energy that Africa needs.