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Abstract
The power plants based on renewable sources face various acceptance difficulties mainly due to high initial costs and low overall
efficiencies. A way to improve performance of these systems is to utilize more than one type of source of energy chosen to provide some
degree of complementarity. An interesting, albeit improbable, combination is obtained using hydroelectric and photovoltaic energy,
taking advantage of the complementarity between these two types of sources coupled to reservoir and/or battery storage. This paper
discusses energy complementarity in time and proposes a numerical dimensionless index, evaluating this energy complementarity
between two types of energy sources, in the same or in different locations, or between two sources of the same type in different locations.
In the end, the results of the application of this index to the solar and water availabilities over the state of Rio Grande do Sul, in southern
Brazil, is presented in the form of maps.
r 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Renewable resources; Energetic complementarity; Hybrid energy systems; Solar energy; Micro-hydropower
0960-1481/$ - see front matter r 2008 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.renene.2008.01.019
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2158 A. Beluco et al. / Renewable Energy 33 (2008) 2157–2165
territory of Great Britain which is scarcely explored due to period. Obviously this is possible only if the available
the small amounts of available energy. energy values are greater than the energy demand.
Time complementarity may exist when the energy Fig. 1 presents two sinusoidal curves, showing a comple-
availability of two or more types of sources present periods mentary instance, which will be considered perfect for the
of availability which are complementary over time in the purposes of the present work. The two curves present
same region. hypothetic availabilities of two sources of energy expressed
Complementarity may also exist when the availability of in terms of energy or power along a year.
energy of only one type of source is considered over a vast Both curves present periods of 1 year, average values
region and over time. As an example, the availability of equal to 1, maximum values equal to 1.2 and minimum
hydraulic energy over the Brazilian territory may be values equal to 0.8. The minimum of the first curve occurs
mentioned and which is one of the main reasons that led at 0.75 of the year whereas the one of the second curve is at
to the interconnection of the south–southeast and the 0.25 of the year or 0.5 year out of phase.
north–northeast electrical energy supply systems. This is an The complementarity between these curves may be con-
example of complementarity in time and space. sidered perfect since the minima and the maxima are 0.5 year
The next section establishes what shall be considered the out of phase, the difference between the maximum and the
perfect complementarity. The two subsequent sections minimum is 0.4 in both cases and the average values are equal.
propose the numerical dimensionless index evaluating this The functions depicted above may represent energy
energy complementarity in time and evaluate the comple- availabilities of two sources or the energy or power
mentarity of hydraulic and solar energy availabilities over supplied by two generators. These functions will be used
the territory of the state of Rio Grande do Sul, in the south for the setup of a complementarity index but they do not
of Brazil, based on this index. adequately describe, in detail, for example, the behavior of
solar sources since these present daily variations, which
have an effect in the detailed behavior of hybrid systems.
3. Energy complementarity in time The need to evaluate how much two availability
functions, which are not perfectly complementary, differ
Different energy availabilities may be considered per- from the situation depicted in Fig. 1, considered as a
fectly complementary if the variation of the availability reference, naturally leads to the creation of numerical
values presents equal periodicity and their respective dimensionless indexes considering the characteristics men-
maximum and minimum values occur in time intervals tioned above. Indexes varying from 0 to 1 are suggested to
half a period apart (out of phase). Furthermore, the evaluate the complementarity between, for instance,
average values of the availabilities should be the same as hydraulic and solar energy availabilities.
well as the relation between the respective maximum and
minimum values of availability of the two sources. 4. Complementarity index
The values of energy supplied by generators in a hybrid
system may also be considered complementary in time even The complementarity index necessarily involves time and
when the values of availability are not completely comple- is elaborated to express the degree of complementarity
mentary. So, the availabilities may present an imperfect between two energy sources. It is defined according to
complementarity and the generators may be sized to supply Eq. (1) and includes the evaluation of three components:
energy values that have the same average values along the the phase difference between the energy availability values
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A. Beluco et al. / Renewable Energy 33 (2008) 2157–2165 2159
1.2 1.2
energy availability of second source
0.4 0.4
0.2 0.2
0 0
0 0.25 0.5 0.75 1 0 0.25 0.5 0.75 1
year year
Fig. 1. Mathematical functions characterizing perfectly complementary energy availabilities along a year.
of the two sources, the relationship between the two number of the day of maximum value of solar energy
average availability values and the relationship between the availability and ds is the number of the day of minimum
amplitudes of variation of the availability functions. value of solar energy availability. This expression may be
rewritten as Eq. (3) supposing that the respective (Dd)
k ¼ kt ke ka . (1)
differences are equal to half a year that is more practical
In this equation kt is the partial time-complementarity for estimates.
index, ke is the partial energy-complementarity index
describing the complementarity between the average values jd h d s j jd h d s j
kt ¼ pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi ¼ . (3)
of energy availability and ka is the partial index of 180 180 180
amplitude-complementarity taking care of the relation
between amplitudes of the variation of the energy
availability of the sources. These partial indexes will be 4.2. Partial energy-complementarity index
discussed in the following sub-sections.
The partial energy-complementarity index, ke, is defined
4.1. Partial time-complementarity index by Eq. (4). It evaluates the relation between the average
values of the availability functions. If the average values
The partial time-complementarity index, kt, is defined by are equal the index should equal to one. If those values are
Eq. (2) and evaluates the time interval between the different the index should be smaller and tend to zero as
minimum values of availability of the two sources of differences increase. Intermediate values of difference are
energy. If this interval is exactly half the period, the index linearly related to the index.
will be equal to one. If the interval is null that is, if the sffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi
availability minima coincide, the index will be equal to Eh Es 2
ke ¼ 1 (4)
zero. Intermediate values are linearly related. Eh þ Es
jd h d s j
kt ¼ pffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi (2) where Eh is the total of the hydraulic energy over the
jDh d h jjDs d s j year and Es is the total solar energy over the same
where Dh is the number of the day of maximum value of period.
hydraulic energy availability, dh is the number of the day of Alternatively, an expression for ke may be developed
minimum value of hydraulic energy availability, Ds is the from a coefficient e as defined by (5). This coefficient varies
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2160 A. Beluco et al. / Renewable Energy 33 (2008) 2157–2165
between 0 and 2, being equal to 1 when energies Eh and Es This index was created to include the difference be-
are equal. When Eh is much bigger than Es, e tends to 2 tween the maximum and the minimum energy availa-
whereas if Eh is much smaller than Es, e tends to zero. bility of the sources in the complementarity evaluation.
2 If one of the sources has no available energy along the period
e¼ . (5) of interest, it is impossible to consider it for complementarity
1 þ ðE h =E s Þ
purposes. If the two sources have the same difference between
The index ke, however, should be ke ¼ 0 if e ¼ 0 or e ¼ 2 maximum and minimum availability, they are ideally com-
and ke ¼ 1 when e ¼ 1. This is obtained by the following plementary and the index should be equal to 1. In the
equation, which is equivalent to (4). intermediate cases where the differences are unequal, the index
qffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffiffi should express it by values between 0 and 1 for complemen-
ke ¼ 1 ð1 eÞ2 . (6) tarity is less than ideal.
The ds difference is always greater than 1 and may be
considered constant over a quite extensive area since it
4.3. Partial amplitude-complementarity index represents the availability of solar radiation.
The dh difference presents a minimum value of 1, in which
The partial amplitude-complementarity index, ka, case the complementarity index should be null. On the other
is defined by Eq. (7) and evaluates the relation between hand, dh may present rather large values as compared to ds
the values of the differences of the maxima to the and in these cases, the index should decay from the
minima of the two energy availability functions. If those maximum value as the dh value increases. This behavior of
differences are equal the index shall be equal to 1. the index as a function of dh for ds ¼ 2 is depicted in Fig. 2.
Otherwise the index shall fall from 1, tending to 0 as For the purpose of the development of the expres-
depicted in Fig. 2. sions for the ka index, described in the next few paragraphs,
8 we also consider the value ds ¼ 2. The resulting curve
>
> ðdh ds Þ2 shall be continuous and smooth, it shall present a
>
>
< 1 for dh pds
ð1 ds Þ2 zero slope for dh ¼ ds, and it shall be very nearly symmetrical
ka ¼ (7) in the proximity of its peak. It is also desirable to obtain an
>
> ð1 ds Þ2
>
> for dh pds : expression for the quick calculation of the ka index.
: ð1 d Þ2 þ ðd d Þ2
s h s There is no obvious mathematical expression for a
function with those characteristics (which can be seen in
This index is obtained from a suitable manipulation between
Fig. 2). The development of an expression for the part of
the dh and ds, differences between the respective maximum and
the curve to the right of the maximum can be based on
minimum values of the energy availabilities. These differences
the Agnesi curve, adapted so that its maximum value is 1
are obtained from the following Eq. (8), where Ed max is the
and corresponds to abscissa equal to ds, which leads to
maximum daily energy availability value in a year, Ed min is the
the expression.
minimum daily energy availability value in a year and Edc is
the year average daily energy consumption. 1
y2 ¼ . (9)
E d max E d min 1 þ ð dh ds Þ 2
d¼1þ . (8)
E dc
1
1
partial amplitude-complementariry index
0.8
0.8
0.6
y1 e y2
0.6
0.4
0.4
0.2
0.2
0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8
0
0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 delta h
delta h
Fig. 3. Superposition of the functions, y1 in lower line and y2 in upper
Fig. 2. Behavior of ka index, as a function of dh, for ds ¼ 2. line.
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A. Beluco et al. / Renewable Energy 33 (2008) 2157–2165 2161
160
Precipitation [mm/month]
120
80
40
0
Jan Fev Mar Abr Mai Jun Jul Ago Set Out Nov Dez
Months
700
RadiationSolar [MJ/m2 month]
525
350
175
0
Jan Fev Mar Abr Mai Jun Jul Ago Set Out Nov Dez
Months
Fig. 5. Monthly average precipitation data and monthly average of daily incident solar radiation data from the Fundac- ão Estadual de Pesquisas
Agropecuárias (FEPAGRO) weather station, in Taquari, RS. Least-squares adjusted curves are in the line over the supplied data.
Fig. 6. Time complementarity between hydraulic and solar energy availability, calculated using data on monthly precipitation and monthly solar radiation
incident on a horizontal surface, in the state of Rio Grande do Sul. The different values of complementarity appear in shades of gray, white corresponding
to no complementarity and black to full complementarity.
was elaborated under the supposition that the energy- The data interpolation net was obtained through the
complementarity index is equal to 1 allover the state. The Kriging method using a commercial software resulting in a
maps show in the dots some of the main cities of the state. 1200-line 1200-column matrix. In all three maps iso-lines
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A. Beluco et al. / Renewable Energy 33 (2008) 2157–2165 2163
Fig. 7. Complementarity between the amplitudes of variation of the hydraulic and solar availabilities, calculated using data on monthly precipitation and
monthly solar radiation incident on a horizontal surface, in the state of Rio Grande do Sul. The different values of complementarity appear in shades of
gray, white corresponding to no complementarity and black to full complementarity.
Fig. 8. Overall complementarity between the hydraulic and solar energy availabilities, calculated using data on monthly precipitation and monthly solar
radiation incident on a horizontal surface, in the state of Rio Grande do Sul. The different values of complementarity appear in shades of gray, white
corresponding to no complementarity and black to full complementarity.
were superimposed on the image generated. In Fig. 6, iso- in steps of 0.10 for values of ka from 0.60 to 1.00. Finally,
lines were drawn in steps of 0.20 for values of kt from 0.20 the iso-lines of k in Fig. 8 were drawn in steps of 0.20 for
to 1.00. In similar manner, iso-lines for Fig. 7 were drawn values varying from 0.20 to 1.00.
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5.3. The complementarity in Rio Grande do Sul The use of monthly averages to calculate time-comple-
mentarity is somewhat inadequate in that it precludes
As can be appreciated in Fig. 6, about 58% of the area of a precise determination of cycle the energy availabilities
the state has a kt greater than 0.60, corresponding to more and, for the amplitude-complementarity index these
than 72 days of phase difference between the minima of the averages mask the maxima and minima of the variations.
two availability curves, the best values occurring from the Nevertheless, the depicted maps allow spotting areas to
southeast to the northwest border. It can also be seen that be initially investigated to take advantage of the com-
nearly 50% of the state area present kt values greater than plementarities. Less expedite results may be obtained,
0.80, that is, phase differences of near 50% of the cycle of for example, using flows determined by regionalization
the hydraulic and solar energies availability, the extreme studies.
values appearing in the center of the state. On the other For the time-complementarity index, the semi-periods of
hand, 4.67% of the state area presents k values greater than the hydraulic and solar availabilities were taken as half a
70%. It is, however, clearly visible that the most adequate year, as suggested in Eq. (3), and the months corresponding
area from the time-complementarity point of view is to the minima of availabilities were defined. The use of, at
generally not the most adequate area from the amplitude- least, daily flow data taken from time-series over decades is
complementarity point of view. The final complementarity recommended for more accurate calculations involving this
index k will consequently show intermediate values in these index. Radiation data, however, are pretty regular.
areas whereas the best values will be near the northwest For the amplitude-complementarity index, precipitation
border. data do not provide a good evaluation for water
As it will be shown later, the systems based on availability since flow, in a given measurement section of
availabilities with higher time-complementarity (which a river, is dependent upon several other factors. However,
can be evaluated from the indexes proposed in this article) since the relationship between the maxima and the minima
tend to presenting less consumer demand satisfaction of precipitation approach very well the relationship
failures. So, from this point of view, the Fig. 6 map shows between the maxima and minima of flow in smaller basins,
the ‘‘best’’ complementarity areas between the hydraulic which is precisely the field for the application for most of
and solar availabilities. the systems aimed at by this work, the evaluation thus
In the same way, as it will be seen later, small differences in obtained is reasonable.
the amplitudes of variation of the hydraulic and solar The calculation of these indexes based on data on the
availabilities also lead to better performing systems. Fig. 7 energy made available by the contemplated conversion
map shows the best-valued areas for the amplitude- equipment (maximum, average and minimum power made
complementarity index that are, consequently, the best areas available by hydroelectric and photovoltaic generators
from this point of view, for consumer demand satisfaction. along a year) yields an evaluation for the use of com-
In areas where the time-complementarity index is less plementarity in the operation of a system. The elaboration
satisfactory the complementarity condition can be helped of the third map, the one for the overall complementarity
by the use of water reservoirs with the effect of improving between the chosen availabilities, required the acceptance
the phase difference between the minima to near a half- of a supposition on the complementarity of average values
year, which is the ideal value. Regions with a smaller kt will of energy.
require bigger accumulation volumes for the system to A precise and reliable evaluation of complementarity in
approach the performance levels corresponding to a full a given place should be based on flow data across a given
complementarity. river section and on incident solar radiation data taken
In areas with lower values for this index the generating daily. The insight on the hybrid system performance gained
systems performance can also be improved by the use of through computer simulations and experimental studies
reservoirs that can help improving the amplitude variation allow the evaluation of the effects of the complementarity
of the hydraulic availability approaching it to the value on the system parameters and may justify deeper and more
corresponding to a perfect complementarity, which is the comprehensive studies for the characterization of the
same as the variation of the solar availability. And, complementarity.
as mentioned above, regions with a smaller index value The Brazilian National Electric Energy Agency, ANEEL,
will need bigger reservoirs for a given level of system centralizes data from pluviometric, fluvial and meteorologi-
performance. cal stations of the whole country, which can be used for the
It is interesting to note, in these two maps, that the areas identification of complementarity. However, only a few
requiring reservoirs, to improve system performance for stations present long and complete time-series of data on
the two different reasons, do not coincide: areas exempt solar radiation or flow in rivers and only in special and
from reservoirs for time complementarity reasons would recent cases are daily flow data available. Moreover, series
require them for amplitude complementarity reasons and of data for rivers in smaller basins have to be obtained by
vice versa. But it should be noted that the smaller values of the application of transposition models on larger basins
the amplitude-complementarity index in the map are better data. Finally, available data are not always verified for
than 50%! consistency.
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6. Conclusions References
The concept of energy-complementarity was discussed [1] McVeigh JC. Energia solar. Lisboa, Portugal: Cetop; 1977. p. 238.
[2] FEPAGRO (Fundac- ão Estadual de Pesquisas Agropecuárias). Atlas
and a numerical non-dimensional index to evaluate the
agroclimático do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre, 3v,
complementarity between energy sources, in a given place 1989.
and over time, was proposed. In the end, some results, in [3] FEPAGRO (Fundac- ão Estadual de Pesquisas Agropecuárias).
map form, are presented concerning the application of this Séries de dados utilizadas para preparac- ão do ‘Átlas agroclimático
index to identify complementarity between hydraulic and do Estado do Rio Grande do Sul’, Personally obtained, unpublished
solar sources of energy along the territory of the state of data, 2000.
Rio Grande do Sul in southern Brazil.