Predicting Solar Potential: A Comprehensive Analysis of On-Grid Rooftop Solar PV System through HelioScope Design

Abstract

This work focuses on designing an MWh generating On-grid Solar PV system installed in Mangalpally, Hyderabad. Regionally, this location receives 5.5 kWh/sq.mts/day of Solar Energy on an average. The main objective of this paper is to designing and simulation of a Solar PV system using a methodology that is capable of analysing the performance in an optimizable way irrespective of the capacity of the PV plant. Such software is HelioScope- a web-based software developed by Folsom Labs. This paper uses HelioScope methodology for simulation for assess and estimate of the Solar Energy Production. The results verify the Solar PV generation of the considered installation area.

Introduction

I. INTRODUCTION

In today's world, " Solar " has become one of those necessary sources that are generally power for the growing demands and technology. This basic technology that produces electricity by harnessing sunlight has become a vital need and India has reached to the 5th global position for deploying solar power. Out of 370 Gigawatts of installed generated capacity, 35% is acquired from all the renewable sources of energy like solar, wind etc.., in which solar is giving 9.5% i.e., 35 GW of energy. [1] Solar, being such source has grown in many aspects enabling consumers themselves to generate power and feed into the Grid. Such PV systems are called as "On-grid" PV systems. [2] In order to install such PV system, we need to properly select the site and the other equipment that are required to establish an operational Grid-tied PV plant. [3] For that, we would require a software that is capable of taking into account of the geographical location, proper layout, connection diagram and the infrastructure of the installation. Here, we go for Helioscope software. Basically, it is a web-based software that was developed by Folsom Lab. [2] It enables us in designing our desirable On-grid PV system by considering the geographical data i.e., longitude and latitude of the area installation has to be simulated.

By correctly inserting the details of the place of installation, and proper selection of PV panels, inverters and transformers, we can demonstrate the results that forecast the power production of this PV plant. Results like output power, energy into the grid, no. of modules, panels grouping etc prove the specificity of the designed PV system. [3] In easy words, we can say that by using this software we can plan, design and estimate efficiency of an On-grid PV system leading us towards analysing the performance of the system.  [4] Previously, they were many software that would evaluate the designing of a PV system. In today's industrial standard, energy estimation has become very important considering the factors like weather changes, shading losses, wiring, panel mismatches, aging etc. But, HelioScope has all the features that aid us in designing a PV system in more detailed manner because it has AutoCad functionality. So, it allows us to complete design in one package. [5]

The Rooftop area selected for Simulation is of Bharat Institute of Engineering and Technology, Mangalpally, Telangana. For proper evaluation proper selection of major components such as PV panels, Inverter and Transformer should be done. As a result after simulation we can obtain ILR (Inverter Load Ratio) that is given as:

Fig 14 represents various system losses for the designed PV system working under tilt angle of 20deg. With azimuth angle of 180 deg. C (South-West). We can observe that, the system losses like AC system inverters, wiring, mismatch, Irradiance, Temperature, Soiling, Reflection, Shading are considered to show Solar PV output.[18]

The energy production potential of the simulation on BIET rooftop for an year is 139.6 MWh with performance ratio of 63.8%. The panels undergo total overall loss of 42.5% based on above figure which is observed. The Potential for Solar irradiation in the Mangalpally area is 5.5 kWh/m^2/day which proves that the design is considerably efficient and potent enough to feed for long term.

Conclusion

An On-grid Solar PV system was designed and results were demonstrated that show the operating temperature of solar PV array is the second biggest contributor for system losses with the value of 11.2% whereas, even at high altitude shadow losses are observed to be 1.3% due to shading. But, the first contributor is AC losses occurring due to clipping because PV array is producing more output which is more for two counts of inverters designed in the circuit so unable to handle and inverter is reducing the voltage of AC and reducing the power output. The AC losses observed can be overcome by using one more inverter count in the simulation, this will aid in balancing the DC/AC ratio and will likely reduce AC losses. These are not major as other losses, but still some minor effect is noticeable. Overall, even with some minor effect the designed On-grid PV plant is potent enough and efficient enough to feed into the grid for long term. This analysis has been done using HelioScope software and evaluation proves designed system efficient and reliable that generates 139,588 MWh annually.

References

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Copyright

Copyright © 2023 Vivek Kumar Shaw. This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.