HYBRID SYSTEM AND DISTRIBUTED GENERATION PLACEMENT FOR AN OPTIMAL MINIGRID RURAL ELECTRIFICATION: CASE STUDY IN MADAGASCAR

Electrical and Electronics Engineering

This paper aims to design and analyze an energy system for rural electrification in order to find the optimal configuration of a mini-grid. Designing is not only to practise a best sizing of power demand in each village of the investigated site but it needs also to use some effective optimization methods for finding the best placement and capacity of the generators which should be implemented on the designed system. However, that system should be technically satisfying and economically attractive. That’s why different types of generator are investigated, whether it is standalone Distributed Generation (DG) system or hybrid system that combines renewable energy with other energy source. Simulation and technical optimization are performed with Matlab software by using Genetic Algorithm (GA) combined with Newton Raphson load flow, while economical optimization is done under HOMER software. Application is carried out in a remote rural community of Antsahalava / Madagascar that have 19 villages and needs a daily consumption of 9.7 MWh/day and a total power demand of 2.4 MW.

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