Assessment of Solar and Wind Energy Resources For Meeting Hourly Energy Demand in India

This investigation aims to assess the power capacity of solar and wind energy of India to achieve the Pariss Agreement to limit global warming to well below 2. The variability of local wind and solar resources in India were analyzed using 14 years of hourly reanalysis weather data. Using this information, the reliability of wind and solar energy generation for meeting Indias electrical energy demand were examined by simulating multiple scenarios. Previously identified renewable energy zones are considered as the potential available power capacity of solar and wind technologies in India. All combined these zones can generate 5x Indias energy current demand. However, when analyzing the hourly energy balance between generation and demand, the energy supply is unreliable most of the time. In fact, when energy is generated solely using solar resources; the proposed energy system configuration can meet energy demand 40% of the time. The most reliable configuration is when the system is overbuilt by 1.75x the demand and uses 25% solar and 75% wind energy; this energy system can meet energy demand 99% of the time. Despite having a high hourly reliability, this configuration requires a great amount of overbuild. To limit overbuild, the integration of energy storage is considered, resulting in a highly reliable energy system with a small amount of overbuild. Achieving an energy generation plan for reducing greenhouse gas emissions in emerging and developing countries (i.g., India).

Project Mentor: Guillermo Terr´en-Serrano

Faculty Advisor: Ranjit Deshmukh