The 4th International Power Engineering and Optimization Conf.

(PEOCO2010), Shah Alam, Selangor, MALAYSIA: 23-24 June 2010

Optimal Sizing and Operational Strategy of Hybrid

Renewable Energy System Using HOMER
1
Nurul Arina bte Abdull Razak, 1,*Muhammad Murtadha bin Othman, Member, IEEE, 1Ismail Musirin, Member, IEEE

Abstract – Nowadays, the power system utility has started to energy is affected by the solar resource that varies according
consider the green power technology in order for the world to to the location. Wind energy conversion and solar energy
have a healthier environment. The wind energy and solar could have great potentials if being used by the resorts on
energy system are chosen in designing a hybrid renewable the Islands of Malaysia especially at the East Coast areas.
power system as they do not release any emission to the The objective of this paper is to determine the best
atmosphere. In addition, by maximizing the use of the
configuration of hybrid renewable system referring to the
renewable energy, the diesel generator used in the system
could also be reduced. Therefore, this paper will discuss on the optimal sizing and operational strategy of diesel generator,
optimization of the renewable energy hybrid system based on wind energy and solar energy that can offer the lowest
the sizing and operational strategy of generating system. The amount of Total Net Present Cost (TNPC). The Hybrid
optimization software used in this analysis is the Hybrid Optimization Model for Electric Renewable (HOMER)
Optimization Model for Electric Renewable (HOMER). The software has been used to perform random selection of
sensitivity analysis is also performed to obtain the optimal sizing and operational strategy of generating system in order
configuration of hybrid renewable energy based on different to obtain the finest solution of hybrid renewable energy with
combinations of generating system. lowest TNPC [2]. Thus, the information required for this
analysis was collected based on the load profile, average
Keywords: Hybrid renewable energy, HOMER, Solar Energy,
monthly wind speed and solar radiation at the Pulau
Wind Energy.
I. INTRODUCTION 1 Perhentian Kecil, Terengganu in the year of 2004. The
Lately, human activities have given bad effects to the Pulau Perhentian Kecil is located at the East Cost area of
ecosystem and also the society. Scientists have proven that Peninsular Malaysia a shown in Fig. 1. The wind speed in
the act of releasing the greenhouse gases to the atmosphere Malaysia is light and varies from one season another in the
has contributed to global warming. In addition, the range of 2 m/s to 13m/s. The north east monsoon which is
materialistic lifestyle and industrialization have also caused from the month of September to March plays important role
to the environmental pollution. Hence, in order to overcome in this region where the strongest wind comes from the
these problems, the renewable energy should be used as it South China Sea to the East Coast [1].
holds the key to a healthy global environment. The major
environmental problems like water pollution, ambient air
quality (Carbon Dioxide, Nitrogen and Sulfur Dioxide gas
emission), acid rain and global warming could also be Pulau Perhentian
solved. Kecil
In Malaysia, energy policies and regulations are being
enacted in order to stop the environmental problems as these
policies are important in helping to achieve the goal of
having sustainable development in Malaysia. The Malaysian
government strategy is to maximize the use of indigenous
energy resource and minimize the negative environmental
impact. The energy efficiency and renewable energy under
the Eighth Malaysian Plan (2001-2005) and the Ninth
Malaysia Plan (2006-2010) are focused on targeting for
renewable energy to be significant contributor and for better
utilization of energy resources. An emphasis to further
reduce the dependency on petroleum has also led to extra
effort in integrating alternative source of energy [1].
Fig. 1. Location of Pulau Perhentian Kecil, Terengganu.
In Malaysia, great attention is given to the solar and
wind energy conversion (WES). The potential of wind II. METHODOLOGY
energy is depending on the wind speed while the solar The proposed hybrid renewable energy system is
comprising of wind turbine and Photovoltaic (PV) array
1
N.A.A. Razak, 1,*M.M. Othman, and 1I. Musirin are with the Faculty of
system. Diesel generator with battery and power converter
Electrical Engineering, Universiti Teknologi MARA, Shah Alam, are added into the system as a backup unit and act as a
Malaysia. M.M. Othman can be reached at mamat505my@yahoo.com. storage system. This system is design specifically for an off

978-1-4244-7128-7/10/$26.00 ©2010 IEEE 495

The 4th International Power Engineering and Optimization Conf. (PEOCO2010), Shah Alam, Selangor, MALAYSIA: 23-24 June 2010

grid system at remote area. The HOMER software is used to A. Electrical load information
determine the optimal sizing and operational strategy for a By referring to the load profile given in Table 1,
hybrid renewable energy system based on three principal 1253kWh/day is the average estimation of daily energy
tasks which are simulation, optimization and sensitivity consumption (kWh/day) taken between these seasons. The
analysis. The following subsection discusses on the three energy load demand of this island is shown in Fig. 2. It is
principal tasks of the HOMER software. observed that the annual peak load of 197 kW is occurred in
March. The large demand occurs during the peak season
A. HOMER: Simulation
that is between March until July and the low demand
HOMER simulates the operation of the system based
happens between the low season that is from August until
on the components chosen by the designer. In this process,
February.
HOMER will perform the energy balance calculation based
on the system configuration consisting several numbers and
sizes of component. In this case study, PV array system,
wind turbine, diesel generator with battery and converter are
the components chosen for the analysis. It then determines
the best feasible system configuration which can adequately
serve the electric demand. HOMER simulates the system
based on the estimation of installing cost, replacement cost,
operation and maintenance cost, fuel and interest.

B. HOMER: Optimization
The optimization process is done after simulating the
entire possible solutions of hybrid renewable energy system Fig. 2. Hourly load variations in a year.
configuration. HOMER display a list of configurations
sorted based on the Total Net Present Cost (TNPC). It can B. Photovoltaic (PV) economic information and solar
be used to compare different types of system configuration resource
from the lowest to the highest TNPC. However, the system The size of a PV array system that used in this system is
configuration based TNPC is varied depending to the 0.055kW. While the capital cost for each capacity is $510 =
sensitivity variables that have been chosen by the designer. RM2,030.08 and the replacement cost is $480 =
RM1,543.68. The solar radiation data is taken from Keniam,
C. HOMER: Sensitivity Analysis Pahang with the latitude of 4.52 N and longitude of 102.47
The HOMER software will repeat the optimization E. This island is close to the Pulau Perhentian Kecil with the
process for every selection of sensitivity variables for the latitude of 5.92 N and longitude of 102.73 E [3]. The time
hybrid renewable energy system. The sensitivity variables zone for this island is GMT +08:00. The array slope angle is
are such as the global solar, wind speed and the price of set to 15o and the array azimuth is 0o which is referring to
diesel fuel. Then, the list of various configurations of hybrid the South direction. The life time for this PV array system is
renewable energy will be tabulated from the lowest to the 20 years with a derating factor of 90% and ground
highest TNPC. The optimal solution of hybrid renewable reflectance is 20%. The PV plant with a tracking system is
energy system is referring to the lowest TNPC. neglected but the effect of temperature is considered. The
clearness index and solar radiation are shown in Table 2 [3].
III. INFORMATION FOR THE HYBRID
RENEWABLE ENERGY SYSTEM Table 2. Clearness index and solar radiation of a PV array system.
The aim of this case study is to carry out an optimal
sizing and operational strategy of the hybrid renewable
energy system. The load profile taken from Pulau
Perhentian Kecil, Terengganu is used to simulate the whole
operation for this system and it is shown in Table 1 [1]. This
island is consisting of several resorts and one fisherman
village which has about 100 family members. The latitude
and longitude for this island are 5.91667 (5o 55’ 0 N) and
102.733 (102o 43’ 60 E), respectively. The life time
estimated for this project is 10 years while the annual
interest rate is fixed at 6%. C. Wind turbine parameters & wind resource
The technical information of wind turbine is shown in
Table 1. Load profile at Pulau Perhentian Kecil, Terengganu. Table 3. The information of average wind speed for Pulau
Estimated daily Max. Perhentian Kecil, Terengganu is shown in Table 4 [1]. The
Occupancy
Season
rate
energy consumption demand blade will not move if the wind speed is below than 5m/s
(kWh/day) (kW) and the blade will automatically stop when the wind speed
Peak season
100% 1721 192 is above 15m/s. The wind speeds over a year is presented in
(March-July)
a Weibull distribution form shown in Fig. 3. The
Low season
(Aug-Feb)
60% 1031 115 autocorrelation factor of r1=0.85 is measured based on the
hour-to-hour randomness of the wind speed. The diurnal

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The 4th International Power Engineering and Optimization Conf. (PEOCO2010), Shah Alam, Selangor, MALAYSIA: 23-24 June 2010

pattern strength of δ=0.26 represents as the strength of a

wind speed and the windiest time is ø=17. Table 5. Diesel generator technical information.
Table 3. Wind energy technical information.

E. Battery
The type of battery that used for the system is
Hoppecke 24 OPzS 3000 model with the rating of 200V,
3000Ah, 6kWh. The cost for one battery is
$1,890=RM6,070.68 with the replacement cost of
$1,700=RM5,460.40. The battery stack is containing several
numbers of batteries and the battery string is 120V(240V).
Table 4. Wind speed information.
F. Power converter.
A power electronic converter is used to maintain the
flow of energy between ac and dc components [4]. The size
of power converter used that used in this system is 1 kW.
The capital cost and replacement costs for this equipment is
$800=RM2,572.80 and $750=RM2,412.00, respectively.
There are four different sizes of converter which are 60kW,
70kW, 90kW and 130kW considered in the design of hybrid
renewable energy system. The lifetime for one unit of
converter is 15 years with the efficiency of 90%.

IV. RESULTS & DISCUSSION

The proposed hybrid renewable energy system for the
Pulau Perhentian Kecil, Terengganu is shown in Fig. 4. It
consists of primary load which is 1253kWh/day, annual
peak load of 197kW, PV system, wind turbine, diesel
generator, battery and a converter serving for an AC
electrical load. The HOMER software will identify the best
possible configuration for the hybrid renewable energy
system. For an example, the optimal sizing and operational
strategy for a hybrid renewable energy system may
sometime consider all of the equipments or without
considering one part of the equipments. Thus, combination
of the equipments is depending on the optimization
procedure and sensitivity variables.

Fig. 3. Weibull probability distribution function of wind speed.

.
D. Diesel generator
The diesel power plant of 80 kW is installed in the
island of Pulau Perhentian Kecil, Terengganu. The diesel
generator information is shown in Table 5. The diesel price
with four discrete values of 0.219$/L=RM0.83/L,
0.337$/L=RM1.28/L, 0.416$/L=RM1.58/L and
0.447$/L=RM1.70/L are used for the sensitivity variables.
At present, the diesel price is about 0.5143$/L=RM1.95/L. Fig. 4. PV-Wind-diesel hybrid system.
The lower heating value is 45.62MJ/kg, density of the fuel
is 831kg/m3 and carbon content is 80%.

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The 4th International Power Engineering and Optimization Conf. (PEOCO2010), Shah Alam, Selangor, MALAYSIA: 23-24 June 2010
A. Optimization of hybrid renewable energy system
HOMER performs the optimization process in order to
determine the best solution of hybrid renewable energy
ystem based on several combinations of equipments. Hence,
multiple possible combinations of equipments could be
obtained for the hybrid renewable energy system due to
different size of PV array system, number of wind turbines,
size of generator, number of batteries and size of dc-ac
converter.
In the optimization process will simulate every
combination system configuration in the search space. The
feasible one will be displayed at optimization result sorted
based on the Total Net Present Cost (TNPC). The
combination of system components is arranged from most
effective cost to the least effective cost. The optimization
results of hybrid renewable energy system are obtained for
every selection of sensitivity variables. Table 6 shows a list
of optimization results for the hybrid renewable energy
system without considering the sensitivity variables. The
results represent different combination of components
which are diesel generator, wind turbine, PV array system,
battery and converter. However, sensitivity variables should
be taken into account in order to obtain a rational result of
hybrid renewable energy system. The average annual wind
speed, diesel fuel price and solar radiation are the sensitivity
variables considered for the optimal design of the system.
B. Hybrid renewable energy system considering sensitivity
variables
HOMER displays the average annual wind speed of
7.4m/s, fuel price of 0.447$/L=RM1.70/L and solar
radiation of 2.8kWh/m2/d for the sensitivity variables shown
in Table 7. It is then used in the optimization process to
obtain the best configuration of hybrid renewable energy
system consisting of wind turbine, diesel generator, PV
array system, battery storage and/or power converter. In this
Table 6. Optimization result without considering sensitivity variables.
Table 7. Optimization result with sensitivity variables.
4
498
case study, the system consisting of wind turbine, diesel
generator, battery storage and/or power converter yields to
the most economical cost with the minimum TNPC of
$997,085=RM3202,637.02 and a minimum Cost of Energy
(COE) of 0.296$/kWh=RM 0.9508$/kWh. However, the
TNPC and COE will become expensive when PV array
system is included in the system. The energy obtained from
different components of hybrid renewable energy system is
shown in Fig. 5. The wind turbine produced 326,941kWh/yr
that is 60% of the total energy served. The remaining 40%
of total energy is served by the diesel generator which is
218,424kWh/yr. This system produced 11.3% of excessive
energy which is 61.427kWh/yr and 0.1% of capacity
shortage that is 404kWh/yr.
In Table 7, for the same sensitivity variables, the
system consisting of wind turbine, diesel generator, battery
storage and converter yields to a lower TNPC value of
$997,085 compared to the rest of combined systems.
However, the combination of diesel generator, battery
storage and converter yields to a lower amount of excessive
electricity that is 65.1kWh/yr or 0.0135% and this is shown
in Fig. 6. This system produce a gas emission of
420,036kg/yr that is higher compared to a gas emission of
181,154kg/yr produced by the system consisting of wind
turbine, diesel generator, battery storage and converter.
The optimization result based on every combination of
sensitivity variables is depicted in graphical form as shown
in Fig. 7. The results show that every sensitivity variable
gives different TNPC value of hybrid renewable energy
system. It is worth mentioning that the sensitivity variables
comprise of wind speed, solar radiation and fuel price. Fig.
7 shows that the TNPC of a hybrid system become
economically feasible when the global solar radiation and
wind speed is set above 2.8kWh/m2/d and 7.0m/s,
respectively. These systems are consisting of wind turbine,
diesel generator, battery storage and converter. It is
The 4th International Power Engineering and Optimization Conf. (PEOCO2010), Shah Alam, Selangor, MALAYSIA: 23-24 June 2010

observed that every TNPC of hybrid system is obtained
based on a fixed diesel price of $0.447/L=RM1.70/L. On
the other hand, the combination of diesel generation, battery
storage and converter yields to a higher value of TNPC that
falls under a region with very low wind penetration that is
less than 7.0m/s.
system that only consisting of diesel system. Tables 8 and 9
show that 60% and 40% of electricity produced by the wind
turbine and diesel generator, respectively able to reduce a
significant amount of gas emission as compared to the
system that only consisting of diesel generator.

C. Green house gases (GHG) reduction

Recently, the world concerns on reduction of green
house gases in order minimize the pollution of gas emission.
The combination of wind turbine and diesel generator able
to reduce the pollution of gas emission compared to a

Fig. 5. Energy obtained from wind turbine and diesel generator with excessive electricity of 11.3%.

Fig. 6. Energy obtained from diesel generator with excessive electricity of 0.0135%.

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The 4th International Power Engineering and Optimization Conf. (PEOCO2010), Shah Alam, Selangor, MALAYSIA: 23-24 June 2010
Fig. 7. Optimal System Type (OST) with fixed diesel price = $0.447/L.
Table 8. Green House Gases (GHG) for diesel generator.
Table 9: Green House Gases (GHG) for wind turbine and diesel
generator.
.
V. CONCLUSIONS
This paper has discussed on the optimization sizing
and operational strategy of hybrid renewable energy system
which refers to the minimum cost of Total Net Present Cost
(TNPC). The result shows that the combination of wind
turbine, diesel generator, battery storage and converter
brings to the optimal configuration of hybrid renewable
energy system applicable to be used as an off-grid system in
Pulau Perhentian Kecil, Terengganu. The following
conclusions can be drawn from the results obtained from the
analysis. There is a high potential of wind resource in Pulau
Perhentian Kecil, Terengganu that can be used for
supporting the renewable energy especially in terms of wind
turbine compared to the solar energy. At present, a wind-
diesel hybrid system has been chosen as the most suitable
solution for the hybrid renewable energy system. The
combination of wind turbine, diesel generator, battery
storage and converter brings to the TNPC value of
500
$997,085=RM 3,202,637.02 that is lower than the TNPC of
$1,033,092=RM 3, 318,291.50 for the hybrid renewable
energy system consisting of diesel generator, battery storage
and converter. The system found that PV array system will
provide electricity during daytime. In order to provide the
electricity at night, PV array system requires a battery
storage and converter as an additional system and this will
increase the cost TNPC. Therefore, this system is not
applicable to be used as an off-grid system in Pulau
Perhentian Kecil, Terengganu. On the other hand, the
combination of wind turbine, diesel generator, battery
storage and converter produce excessive amount of
electricity that can be reduced by adding a large capacity of
battery storage with converter. This will control the hybrid
renewable energy system to produce electricity closely to
the load consumption. Furthermore, the wind turbine serves
60% of total energy and this will reduce 57% of gas
emission (CO2).
VI. REFERENCES
[1] Z.M. Darus, N.A. Hashim, S.N.A. Manan, M.A.A. Rahman, K.N.A.
Maulud and O.A. Karim, “The Development Of hybrid Integrated
renewable Energy System (Wind & Solar) for Sustainable Living at
perhentian Island, Malaysia”, European Journal of Social Science,
Vol. 9, No.4, 2009.
[2] Hybrid Optimization Model for electric Renewable Energy
(HOMER), http://homerenergy.com/download.asp
[3] S. Shaari, K. Sopian and A.M. Omar, ‘Solar Irradiation Handbook
For Photovoltaic Systyem Design in Malaysia’, Solar Energy
Research Institute, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia.
[4] M.J. Khan and M.T. Iqbal, “Pre-feasibility study of stand –alone
Hybrid Energy System for Application in Newfounland”, Renewable
Energy, Vol. 30, pp. 835-854, 2005.
VII. BIOGRAPHIES
Nurul Arina bte Abdull Razak obtained the B.Eng. (Hons) degree from
Universiti Teknologi MARA, Shah Alam, Malaysia, in 2010. His area of
research interest is in optimal sizing and operational strategy of hybrid
renewable energy system; and distributed generation.
The 4th International Power Engineering and Optimization Conf. (PEOCO2010), Shah Alam, Selangor, MALAYSIA: 23-24 June 2010

Muhammad Murtadha bin Othman received

the B.Eng. (Hons) degree from Staffordshire
University, U.K., in 1998; the M.Sc. degree
from Universiti Putra Malaysia, Serdang,
Malaysia, in 2000 and Ph.D. degree from
Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, Bangi,
Malaysia, in 2006. He is currently the Chair,
Centre of Electrical Power Engineering Studies
(CEPES), Faculty of Electrical Engineering,
Universiti Teknologi MARA, Malaysia. His
area of research interests are artificial intelligence, transfer capability
assessment and reliability studies in a deregulated power system. He is a
member of IEEE.

Ismail bin Musirin obtained the Diploma of

Electrical Power Engineering in 1987, Bachelor
of Electrical Engineering (Hons) in 1990; both
from Universiti Teknologi Malaysia, MSc in
Pulsed Power Technology in 1992 from
University of Strathclyde, United Kingdom and
PhD in Electrical Engineering from Universiti
Teknologi MARA, Malaysia in 2005. He is
currently the Deputy Dean of Research and
Industry Network, Faculty of Electrical
Engineering, Universiti Teknologi MARA,
Shah Alam, Selangor. His area of research interests are artificial
intelligence, voltage stability studies, and application of microgrid and
distributed generation in power system.

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