Sizing and designing a stand-alone photovoltaic electricity generation system using a customized simulation program

The electricity consumption in Malaysia has been rising steadily over the last decade and electricity demand has been projected to increase by 4-5% per annum for the next five years. The increase in electricity demand in the years to come only means that more fuel is needed to generate the amount of electricity needed to meet demand. However, a disturbing fact is that electricity generation in our nation is still largely dependent of the combustion of fossil fuels. Concerns and issues tied to these fuels are raising interest in the utilization of alternative energy sources such as solar energy for electricity generation. The stand-alone photovoltaic electricity generation system (PVEGS) needs to be sized and designed properly prior to system set up. Since setting up a PVEGS is rather extensive and complicated, a simulation program that performed system sizing and designing prior to implementation was necessary. A simulation program was developed in MATLAB and is customized for the Malaysian context. In this paper, the sizing and designing of a stand-alone PVEGS for a small household load performed using the locally acclimatized simulation program is discussed. The site selected for this study is Ipoh. The life-cycle cost (LCC) analysis of the system is also reviewed to estimate the cost of the proposed PVEGS. The thorough sizing, designing and costing method discussed in this paper encourages the use of PVEGSs to meet our electricity needs especially for rural electrification.