Energy Conversion and Management: X 20 (2023) 100490

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Energy Conversion and Management: X

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An eco-friendly remote sensing assisted development procedure to install

renewable energy infrastructure for highest techno-economic gain
Reza Fardi Asrami , Ali Sohani , Mona Zamani Pedram , Hoseyn Sayyaadi *
Optimization of Energy Installations Lab., Faculty of Mechanical Engineering-Energy Division, K.N. Toosi University of Technology, P.O. Box: 19395-1999, No. 15-19,
Pardis St., Mollasadra Ave., Vanak Sq., Tehran 1991 943344, Iran

A R T I C L E I N F O A B S T R A C T

Keywords: By taking socio-economic, terrain, and meteorological impacts into account, an eco-friendly methodology to sort
Geographic information system the potential locations for installation of renewable energy infrastructure has been proposed, which is also able to
Eco-friendly technology address the most important challenge in the field, i.e., determination of the best contribution of the renewable
Renewable energy
energy sources. For this purpose, three advanced approaches, namely, remote sensing by geographic information
Techno-economic gain
Clean energy production
system (GIS), optimization, and weighted decision-making are employed. Moreover, a sensitivity analysis is
conducted to evaluate the influence of land prices, nominal capacity, and relative importance of technical and
economic indicators in decision-making. Iran is chosen as the case study because it has significant solar and wind
energy potential and also has serious energy, economic, and environmental issues. The findings indicate an
optimal land price of $200 per m2, a hub nominal capacity of 50 MW, and an equal weighting of objective
functions for the case study. The average energy generation, levelized cost of energy (LCOE), PV ratio, and land
utilization are projected to reach 288.5 GWh.year− 1, 0.3260 $.(kWh)-1, 4.15 %, and 2362334 m2, respectively
when the optimal procedure is applied. The sensitivity study also shows that relative to PV, the contribution of
wind turbines increases with plant size.

1. Introduction
Environmental pollutions have been on a steady rise in past decades,
caused by heavy dependency of energy sector to fossil fuels [1–3].
Renewable energies are reasonable alternatives to not only reduce the
dependency on limited fossil fuels, but also manage the ever-growing
environmental problems [4–6]. The growth rate for renewable energy
usage between 2009 and 2019 have been 13.4 % per annum, while this
growth rate for 2020 was 9.7 % [7]. Solar and wind energies are
considered as the main sources of renewable energy production, with
wind and PV farms producing 50 % and 27 % of the total, respectively
[8–10]. PV panels are noiseless, can be used in small scales, and are
functional if one of them gets damaged, while wind turbines are mostly
used in large scales, and produce a more constant energy [11–13]. On
the other hand, both of these two energy sources have their own dis­
advantages [14–16]. PV farms are dysfunctional in sunless days, and
wind turbines can get damaged if the wind speed drops below a certain
amount, which can cause fluctuation in energy production flow [17]. A
wind-PV hybrid system can overcome these obstacles, and improve the
reliability of the power plant [18]. The wind turbines can meet the
demand in low radiation days, while PV panels can maintain the energy
flow in case the wind turbine is not working [19–21].
Choosing the location of a wind-PV hybrid system is of great
importance [22]. A minimum of annual radiation and average wind
speed should be considered, since a location with low wind speed not
only can cause damage to the turbines [23], but it also will not produce
enough energy to make the investment justifiable from economic aspects
[24]. Different factors affect the generated energy of solar and wind
farms e.g., radiation, wind speed, terrain slope, elevation, and orienta­
tion of the panels [25]. A hybrid system should have a minimum dis­
tance to residential areas to avoid inconvenience to human life, and it
should not be located too far from main roads for ease of availability
[26]. Using a Geographic information system (GIS) approach for site
selection of hybrid power plants can provide the opportunity to exclude
unsuitable locations based on the geographical restrictions [27].
Furthermore, on-site configuration of PV panel and wind turbine is of
great importance, since the optimized energy production is dependent
on the ratio of PV/wind potential of each location [28].
Saraswat et al. [29] used GIS and MCDM to find the locations of solar
and wind farms in India. Evaluation criteria are divided into technical,
socio-environmental, and economic factors. Investigated locations are

* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: sayyaadi@kntu.ac.ir (H. Sayyaadi).

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ecmx.2023.100490
Received 30 July 2023; Received in revised form 15 October 2023; Accepted 14 November 2023
Available online 15 November 2023
2590-1745/© 2023 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
R. Fardi Asrami et al. Energy Conversion and Management: X 20 (2023) 100490

Nomenclature Abbreviations
AHP Analytic hierarchy process
Ap Panel’s area (m2) BOS Balance of system
At Turbine’s swept area (m2) CRF Capital recovery factor
Ccap Initial capital cost ($) GIS Geographical information system
Co&m Cost of operation and maintenance ($) LCOE Levelized cost of energy
Ctotal Total annualized cost ($) MCDM Multi-criteria decision-making
d Discount rate MDBP Minimum distance between panels
D Rotor diameter (m) NOCT Nominal operating cell temperature
G Annual radiation STC Standard test condition
GSTC Radiation under STC (W.m-2) TOPSIS Technique for order of preference by similarity to ideal
n Life span of hybrid farm (years) solution
PPV Produced energy from PV panels (kWh) PV Photovoltaic
Ptotal Total produced energy from hybrid farm (kWh)
Greek symbols
Pw Produced energy from wind turbine (kWh)
α Altitude angle (Degrees)
T Panel temperature (℃)
η Panel’s efficiency
Ta Ambient temperature (℃)
ηm Modified efficiency of panel
Tcoeff Temperature coefficient of panel (%.K-1)
θ Tilt angle of panel (Degrees)
TSTC Temperature under STC (℃)
ρ Air density (kg.m− 3)
V Average wind speed (m.s-1)
Wp Width of the panel
z Azimuth angle

grouped into five categories of highly suitable, suitable, moderately
suitable, less suitable, and not suitable, but the site-selection was done
separately for PV and wind farms.
On another study, Ali et al. [30] explored suitable areas to set hybrid
PV-wind farms, by multi-criteria GIS modeling techniques. A minimum
wind velocity of 4 m.s− 1, irradiance of 3.5 kW.m− 2.day− 1, and other
factors like slope and residential buffers has been considered to exclude
unsuitable locations. Furthermore, AHP approach was used as a MCDM
to evaluate the remaining location.
Effat et al. [31] used geospatial data for optimum selection of hybrid
solar-wind energy sites in Egypt. Solar radiation, panel orientation, and
slope were selected as limiting criteria for solar energy, while wind
speed, slope, and elevation were considered as wind energy criteria.
Distance to conversion stations, distance to main roads, distance to
urban areas, and land-use were attributes for infrastructure and envi­
ronment criteria. A weight was assigned to all of the criteria for optimum
site selection using the rank-sum method.
Table 1 contains other recently conducted studies for hybrid, solar,
and wind farms site selection. Based on the criteria in Table 1, gap of
knowledge in the previous studies is outlined as:
• Using GIS for site selection of solar, wind, or hybrid power plants can
help eliminate unsuitable locations. In some cases, a location was
considered as case study, without considering the geographical
limitation of renewable power plants.
• A hybrid power plant can improve the reliability of the power pro­
duction and avoid fluctuation in energy flow. PV and wind criteria

Table 1
Recent conducted studies.
Study Summary & approach GIS Hybrid site- Techno- Optimized on-site PV-
approach? selection? economic wind configuration?
analysis?

Dalwadi et al. Optimize stand-alone solar-wind hybrid power system and to maximize use of No No Yes No
[32] renewable energy generation system while minimizing the total system cost
Hatata et al. An optimization method for sizing a solar/wind/battery hybrid power system No No Yes No
[33] based on the artificial immune system
Ara et al. Two-level planning to assess the techno-economic feasibility of hybrid offshore No Yes Yes Yes
[34] wind-solar PV power plants
Tercan [35] Develop a GIS-Best Worst Method based Eco mentalist land suitability model to Yes No No No
identify optimal locations for wind farms
Tercan et al. Contribute to the growth, expansion, advancement, and location selection of Yes No No No
[36] PV farms using GIS, AHP, Weighted Linear Combination, and Inverse Distance
Weighting approaches
Cunden et al. A MCDM process together with GIS to analyze multiple constraints that affect Yes No No No
[37] the siting of wind farms
Xu et al. [38] A novel method integrating GIS, interval AHP and stochastic VIKOR was Yes No No No
proposed to tackle site selection issue of wind farms in the Wafangdian region,
China
Ifaei et al. An algorithm-based data processing, sizing, optimization, sensitivity analysis Yes Yes Yes No
[39] and clustering approach is proposed as an efficient simultaneous solar/wind
assessment methodology
Dhunny et al. Identification of optimal wind, solar and hybrid wind-solar farming sites using No Yes Yes No
[40] fuzzy logic modelling
Jahangiri Find the ideal locations for construction of hybrid solar-wind power stations in Yes Yes No No
et al. [41] Middle-East using Boolean model in GIS software

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R. Fardi Asrami et al.
should be considered simultaneously for site selection, while most
studies did not consider them at the same time.
• The produced energy affects the economic aspects of power plant,
and justifiability of power plant from economic aspects can incen­
tivize the investors. A techno-economic analysis of each location can
be incredibly useful for optimized site-selection, but this analysis was
neglected in some of the studies.
• Annual radiation, average wind speed, elevation, and annual mean
temperature are different for each location, so the optimized
configuration of PV panels and wind turbines will be variable. The
PV/wind energy production ratio should be calculated in each
location, but only one of the recent studies carried out this
calculation.
Based on the gap of knowledge from previous studies, which could be
detected by checking the answers to the questions in Table 1, the nov­
elties of current study are covering all the indicated items at the same
time:
• A GIS approach has been outlined to eliminate unsuitable locations
for hybrid power plant establishment based on socio-economic,
meteorological, and terrain properties of each location.
• PV and wind farms minimum requirements have been applied on GIS
approach to only investigate locations that are suitable for hybrid
power plant installation.
• With considering different PV panel and wind turbine models, the
generated energy and economic parameters are calculated for each
possible location, providing the chance to investigate each location
from techno-economic point of view, and usage of MCDM with en­
ergy and economic parameters as objective functions.
• A computer code is developed to find the best configuration and best
PV/wind ratio for each location by finding the closest configuration
to the ideal answer.
• A sensitivity analysis is carried out to analyze the effect of variation
in land price, nominal capacity, and weight of objective functions in
TOPSIS.
2. Methodology
This section shows the steps in finding the best locations for hybrid
power plant.
2.1. GIS approach
In order to utilize GIS approach, ArcMap software from ESRI is used.
The software provides the user with multiple tools to eliminate, edit, or
create maps. For the purpose of this study, the maps of annual radiation,
annual mean wind speed, annual mean temperature, and topography of
case study are merged to create a unified layer for analysis. Each loca­
tion in this map contains geographical coordinates alongside elevation
from sea level and other characteristics, and based on the implied re­
strictions, unsuitable points are eliminated from the map. A Boolean
strategy is used in this study to classify the investigated locations. Based
on the previous works and potentials of study area, a threshold is
specified for socio-environment, terrain, and meteorological properties,
which indicates if a location has the minimum specifications to be
considered as a hybrid power plant site.
2.1.1. Socio-economic restrictions
All locations with high population density or high traffic can become
prone to danger if renewable power generation sites are established too
close to them. Furthermore, environmentally sensitive areas should have
a safe distance with wind and PV farms to avoid any conflict or harmful
impact on each other. Therefor a minimum or maximum distance is
considered for locations of high interest.
Distance to settlements. A minimum distance to residential areas
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Energy Conversion and Management: X 20 (2023) 100490
should be considered to avoid disruption of geographical development.
On the other hand, high distance to urban or rural areas creates acces­
sibility issues, which makes the selected site less economically and so­
cially justifiable. For this study, a minimum and maximum distance of 2
and 10 km are selected, respectively.
Distance to main roads. A high distance with main roads makes
equipment and material transportation very hard. A minimum distance
of 1 km is considered to avoid accidents, while a maximum of 10 km
distance is chosen for ease of transportation.
Distance to railways and airports. PV panels can cause problems
for the pilot’s vision, or there can be adverse effect on airplanes, caused
by wind turbines. To avoid this and any other accident, hybrid sites
should have a considerable distance to airports and railways. Based on
the literature, the minimum distance is considered to be 3 km.
Distance to natural resources. To avoid any harmful activity for
natural resources e.g., forests, protected areas, etc., a minimum distance
of 4 km to natural resources is considered for hybrid power plants, based
on previous studies.
Distance to waterbodies. Areas close to rivers, damns, or lakes are
potential flood zones in bad weather, while being usually crowded. The
minimum distance to water bodies in this study is considered to be 2 km.
2.1.2. Terrain restrictions
The Terrain situation has direct effect on the efficiency of power
plant. In this section, three important factors for land suitability are
pointed out.
Slope. Smoothness of the land is defined as slope. A higher slope
indicates that the land has more ups and down, which hardens the
installation of PV panels and wind turbine. Based on the previous
studies, a maximum slope of 10 % for wind turbine and 5 % for PV
panels is selected. In this study, a 5 % slope is chosen as the threshold for
this property.
Elevation. As indicated on previous studies, e.g., Zoghi et al. [42],
higher altitude location receive better radiation due to thin atmosphere,
while having less flora and fauna species [43]. On the other hand, higher
altitude locations have higher transmission and transportation costs
[44]. For this study, a maximum elevation of 2000 m from sea level is
considered as exclusion criteria.
Land cover. Installation of PV panels or wind turbines on a land with
unsuitable vegetation not only can cause problem for contractors, but it
also can harm the vegetation or even destroy it. Based on the literature,
the suggested area for PV and wind farm installation are mostly bare
areas and lands with short vegetations. To be more specific, according to
[45] and [29], European Space Agency (ESA) specifies 4 suitable
vegetation from globe cover map for PV farm installation, i.e., mosaic
vegetation, close to open vegetation, sparse vegetation and bare areas.
Mosaic and close to open vegetations consists of croplands, shrublands,
and grass lands which are indication of short vegetation. The acceptable
land covers are extracted from globe cover using ArcGIS and applied to
the base layer.
2.1.3. Meteorological limitations
Meteorological characteristics of each location are the most impor­
tant factors in hybrid farm site selection. These characteristics are
measured annually and presented as average values throughout the
year.
Radiation. Locations with high radiation are obvious choices for PV
farm installation. Different studies consider a radiation higher than 1500
kWh.m− 2.year− 1 as moderately suitable radiation for PV utilization
[29,31,43,46]. Current study considers 1700 kWh.m− 2.year− 1 as the
minimum radiation for site selection, since the study area has high po­
tential for solar energy.
Wind speed. As indicated in Table 2, previous studies consider any
wind speed below 4 m.s− 1 unsuitable for wind turbine operation, which
is the cut-in speed in which the turbine stops working.
In this study, the minimum wind speed for exclusion areas is
R. Fardi Asrami et al. Energy Conversion and Management: X 20 (2023) 100490

Table 2
Exclusion criteria in previous conducted studies.
Exclusion criteria Saraswat et al. [29] Ali et al. [30] Effat Tercan et al. [35,36] Günen Anwarzai [47] Current study
et al. [46]
[31]

Radiation (kWh. 1600 1300 1500 1200 1600 1300 1700

m− 2.year− 1)
Wind speed (m.s− 1) 4 4 6 4.4 – 6 6
Slope (%) Max of 5 % Max of 5 Maxx of Max of 10 Max of 5 Max of 5 Max of 5
5
Annual temperature – – – Max of 10.5 Max of – Max of 15
(℃) 12.7
Elevation (m) Max of 1500 Max of 200 Min of Min of 3000 – Max of 2000
400
Distance to Min of 10 Min of 1 Min of 5 Min of 1 Min of 2 Min of 2 Min of 2
settlements (km) Max of Max of 10 Max of 10 Max of 10
50
Distance to main Max of 10 Max of 10 Min of 1 Min of 0.15 Min of 2 Max of 10 Min of 1
roads (km) Min of 0.5 k Max of Max of 10
10
Distance to railways Min of 7 Min of 3 – Min of 0.1 Min of 2 Min of 3.5 Min of 3
and airports (km)
Distance to natural Min of 10 Min of 1.5 – Min of 4 – – Min of 4
resources (km)
Distance to water Min of 7 Min of 0.4 Min of 1 Min of 1 Min of 4 Min of 0.4 Min of 2
bodies (km)
Land Cover Barren or sparsely Bare land, Bare Avoid urban, industrial, – Bare soil, Sand Mosaic, close to open, and
vegetated, mosaic, shorter land, commercial, vegetated, and covered area sparse vegetation, and
grassland, and shrubland vegetation desert transport areas bare areas

considered to be 6 m.s− 1.
Mean Temperature. PV panels are affected by the ambient tem­
perature. Based on the panel’s characteristics, as the temperature of
panel exceeds the temperature of standard test condition (STC), its ef­
ficiency reduces with a constant ratio, i.e., temperature coefficient of
panel. Locations with high mean temperature are not suitable for hybrid
energy harvesting. Based on the range of mean annual temperature of
case study, and previous study investigation, a maximum temperature of
15 ℃ is selected as exclusion limit.
Table 2 consists of considered exclusion criteria in the previous study
and the selected limits for current study. Applying these restrictions on
the base layer maps, eliminates locations that are not suitable for hybrid
power plant establishment.
making it one of the richest countries in the world for average received
radiation. Although Iran is not as rich in wind speed as it is for solar
radiation, the country has locations with high potential for wind farm
installations with wind speed up to 17 m.s− 1. Fig. 1 shows the average
wind speed and radiation of Iran [51].
Iran has a low efficiency (30 %) in centralized power systems,
transmission, and distribution system, and is ranked 10th in emission
production worldwide [39]. These reasons have motivated the govern­
ment to increase the share of renewables in the total energy production,
making the country an ideal case study for this investigation.
After careful implementation of exclusion criteria, 696 locations
have been identified as possible sites for hybrid farm establishment.
Fig. 2 shows the distribution of possible locations for Iran.

2.2. Case study 2.3. Energy modelling

Iran is selected as the case study of the current research. The country The produced energy of PV and wind farms is dependent on different
is one the largest energy producers in the middle east, which is heavily factors, e.g., efficiency of panel, mean temperature, wake area, etc. In
dependent in fossil fuel energy [48–50]. The average annual solar ra­ this section, the generated energy of both PV panels and wind turbine
diation in the country is between 1650 and 2000 kWh.m− 2.year− 1, are modelled and calculated.

Fig. 1. Maps of the average annual wind speed and radiation of Iran [52].

4
R. Fardi Asrami et al.
Fig. 2. Possible sites for hybrid farm establishment.
2.3.1. Produced energy
Solar energy production by PV panels is dependent on received ra­
diation, panel’s area, and panel’s efficiency [53]:
PPV = ηm × Ap × G (1)
In Eq. (1), ηm , Ap , and G represent panel’s modified efficiency, panel’s
area, and received radiation respectively. Depending on the number of
panels, the total produced energy from PV panels can be obtained.
Panel’s temperature has a direct effect on its efficiency. Eq. (2) and (3)
shows the calculation of modified efficiency [33]:
(NOCT − 20)
T = Ta + GSTC (2)
800
ηm = η + (T − Tstc ) × Tcoeff (3)
In Eq. (2), T is panel’s temperature, Ta is ambient temperature, NOCT is
nominal operating cell temperature from data sheet, and GSTC is the
radiation under STC. In Eq. (3) η is the efficiency of the panel under STC,
Tstc is STC which is equal to 25 ℃, and Tcoeff is the temperature coeffi­
cient of selected PV panel. A similar energy model has been used in [54],
in which a comparison was made between the model and real PV farms,
which indicated the validity of the current model. In order not to make
the work lengthy by providing repetitive information, that reference has
been cited for more information.
The produced energy from wind turbine can be modeled through Eq.
(4) [37]:
1
Pw = ρ A t V 3 (4)
2 Ptotal
where ρ is the air density, At is the swept area by turbine blades, and V is
the average wind speed in the location of installation. The total gener­
ated energy from hybrid power plant obtained by Eq. (5).
Ptotal = PPV + Pw (5)
2.3.2. Optimal spacing
A low distance between rows of solar panels can cause shading in
certain times during the day, which leads to power loss. In order to avoid
this, an optimal distance should be considered between PV panels [55].
As suggested in [48], PV panels receive the most energy between 9 A.M.
to 3P.M., and the longest shadow is created in winter solstice. Based on
this, minimum distance between panels (MDBP) is calculated through
Eq. (6).
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Energy Conversion and Management: X 20 (2023) 100490
sin(z)
MDBP = Wp sin(θ) (6)
tan(α)
In Eq. (6), Wp is width of the panel, and θ is panel’s tilt angle, while z and
α are azimuth and altitude angles, respectively. As a common estimation
and based on previous studies, the tilt angle of panel is equal to latitude
of the location [56,57].
Different factors should be considered for wind turbine placement.
Visual influence and noise of the turbines require a distance between
farms and residential areas, which is suggested to be 1000 to 1200 m in
[58]. Based on the applied geographical restrictions, this distance is
considered for hybrid farm site.
For distance between turbines, wake effect of turbines should be
minimized [59]. Choi et al. [60] conducted a numerical study on hori­
zontal axis wind turbines. Distance between turbines in the prevailing
wind direction was changed from 3 rotor diameter (D) to 7D, and ratio of
generated power by upstream turbine to downstream turbine was
calculated in each case. Based on the results, there was a non-linear
relationship between power ratio and separation distance, but beyond
the distance of 5D increase in the power ratio was not significant. Hence,
the optimal distance between wind turbines in the prevailing wind di­
rection is selected to be 5 times of turbines blade diameter.
For distance perpendicular to wind direction, Panaitescu et al. [61]
suggests a distance of 2–5 times of rotor diameter, while Schwanz et al.
[62] and Gupta [63] propose a 5D and 3-5D distance would be suitable.
In this study, a minimum distance of 3D is considered for the distance
between wind turbines in perpendicular direction of wind. Fig. 3 shows
the schematic of a hybrid power plant.
2.3.3. PV panels and wind turbine: Model selection
For a constant area, changing the size of wind turbine leads to a
drastic change in farm’s layout and generated power, while a change in
the solar panel would not affect the layout significantly. For the purpose
of this study, three different large-scale turbines from Vestas Company
are selected, which are presented on Table 3. Vestas company is the
leading manufacturer in wind turbines, covering 16 % of installed ca­
pacity worldwide [64].
For PV panel model, Hi-Mo5 PV panel from LONGi company is
selected for simulation (see Table 4 for the specifications) [65].
2.4. Economic modelling
For economic evaluation of hybrid power plant, Levelized cost of
energy (LCOE) is considered as the economic objective function. LCOE
indicates the cost of the produced electricity, which is independent of
the production source, making it a valuable parameter for comparison.
Ctotal
LCOE = (7)
In Eq. (7), Ctotal is the total annualized cost, and Ptotal is the total
generated energy per year by hybrid farm. Ctotal is illustrated in (8).
Ctotal = Ccap ⋅CRF + CO&M (8)
where Ccap is the initial capital cost, CO&M is the annual cost of operation
and maintenance, and CRF is capital recovery factor which in other
word is annualizing factor based on the discount rate. CRF is calculated
through Eq. (9),
d(1 + d)n
CRF = (9)
[(1 + d)n − 1]
where d is the discount f actor, and n is the life span of power plant,
which is considered to be 20 years. Ccap consists of costs of wind tur­
bines, PV panels, and balance of system (BOS) costs, which refers to all
of the components except wind turbines and solar panels, e.g., support
R. Fardi Asrami et al. Energy Conversion and Management: X 20 (2023) 100490

Fig. 3. Schematic of a hybrid power plant.

aspect of the project is more valuable than the quantity of produced

Table 3
energy, more weight should be given to LCOE, and if the amount of
Selected wind turbine models.
produced energy is more important than producing a cheaper energy,
Turbine Rated Power Rotor Diameter (m) Swept Area (m2) the generated energy should be given more weight in TOPSIS decision
model (MW)
making. This matter is investigated in this paper and the results are
V100 2 100 7854 discussed in the next section.
V136 3.45 136 14,527
Fig. 4 is a demonstration of how the code is implemented to choose
V172 7.2 172 23,235
the best configurations for each possible point. It should be noted that
large computations are required in this project, since the code loops
through every possible configuration of all possible locations.
Table 4
Selected PV module.
3. Results and discussion
PV Panel Rated Size (mm) Efficiency at Temperature
Model power (W) STC (%) coefficient (%.℃-1)
In this section the results of the current project are analyzed. The best
Hi-Mo5 545 2256 × 21.3 − 0.340 configurations for each possible location are obtained using the devel­
1133 × 35
oped computer code. Total nominal power of the hybrid farm, land cost,
and weight of objective functions in TOPSIS are three variables that
structure, connection cable, inverters and transformers. Wind turbine affect the results. The total nominal power of hybrid power plant is
costs comprises 70 % of the wind farm costs, while 30 % of the total is considered to be 30 MW, while cost of 1 square meter of land is 30 $ and
dedicated to BOS [66,67]. On the other hand, PV module cost about 35 LCOE and GE are given same weight in TOPSIS calculations. These
% of the total PV farm expenditure, while the rest is dedicated to BOS values are considered as base characteristics of the power plant, but a
[68]. At the last quarter of 2021, the average price of wind turbines for sensitivity analysis should be applied to each of these values to under­
Vestas company was 810 $.kW− 1, while the selected PV panel costs stand how they affect the results.
around 0.23 $.W− 1 [69]. GE, LCOE, PV ratio and Land use provide useful and sufficient in­
formation about the hybrid power plant. GE is necessary for demand
load analysis, LCOE determines if the project is economically feasible,
2.5. Optimized layout PV ratio shows the dependency to wind and PV sources, and amount of
the occupied land would be practical knowledge in order to assess the
Based on each location, hybrid farm’s layout can vary. Three economic justifiability of project.
different wind turbines and one model of PV panel are selected for For the base variables, Table 5 demonstrates the average of total
obtaining the optimized layout of each location using a developed generated energy, LCOE, PV ratio and land use of all possible points.
computer code. Geographical specifications, annual radiation, average Table 5 shows that establishing a 30 MW hybrid power plant in each
wind speed, annual mean temperature, and characteristics of panel and of the possible points, would result in 196.4 GWh of produced energy on
wind turbines are given as input to the code, and the optimized PV/wind average in each location, with 0.122 $ per kWh of electricity.
ratio is calculated for each location as the output using multi-criteria Different scenarios can be defined to analyze the results of this study.
decision making. TOPSIS is used to find the closest solution to the Any change in nominal capacity of power plant, land cost, and weight of
ideal answer, which is maximum generated energy and minimum LCOE. objective functions in MCDM can change the results drastically, so
The code loops through every possible combination of PV and wind different scenarios are introduced in this section to help the stakeholders
turbines, calculating the generated energy and LCOE of each layout as for policy making.
objective functions.
Different weight can be given to these objective functions which will
affect the results, based on the priority of stakeholders. If the economic

6
R. Fardi Asrami et al.
Fig. 4. Steps of the implemented code.
Table 5
Average values for the base variables.
GE (GWh.year− 1) LCOE ($.kWh− 1) PV ratio (%) Land use (m2)
196.4 0.122 4.96 2,066,870
3.1. More output or cheaper energy?
For the base values, the weight of LOCE and generated energy of the
farm are considered equal, meaning that both of these objective func­
tions have the same importance in decision making. If a cheaper energy
is desirable, more weight should be given to LCOE in TOPSIS, but if the
amount of generated energy is more important, GE should have more
weight in MCDM.
As anticipated, as the weight of LOCE in TOPSIS is increased, average
generated energy and LCOE decrease. Fig. 5c indicates that PV ratio is
very sensitive to LCOE weight and dramatically rises with increase of it.
In other words, increasing the share of PV panels in hybrid power plants
leads to cheaper energy production. Fig. 5d shows a down trend for Land
use with the rise of LCOE weight. Wind turbines produce more energy,
but they need more space compared to PV panels and cost more which
results in higher LCOE. When the LCOE weight is set to 0.7 instead of
0.5, the developed code chooses a configuration with more PV ratio.
Although the generated energy declines, average LCOE drops around
0.08 $.kWh− 1 which makes the configuration closest to the ideal answer.
7
Energy Conversion and Management: X 20 (2023) 100490
3.2. Nominal Capacity: How does the size of hybrid farm affect the
configurations?
The produced energy from a hybrid farm is dependent on nominal
capacity of the farm and geographical suitability. Nominal capacity
determines the size of power plant, and how many panels or wind tur­
bines should be installed in it.
The nominal capacity of the hybrid farm changes from 10 MW to 100
MW for the case study in Fig. 6. By increasing the size of hybrid farm, the
generated energy and land usage rises with a constant slope. As can be
seen from Eq. (1) and Eq. (4), number of PV panels and wind turbines are
directly involved in generated energy calculation, and with growth in
the size of the farm the number of panels and turbines increases which
leads to more generated energy and more land usage. Fig. 6b and 6c
indicate that higher nominal capacity generally leads to higher average
LCOE and lower PV ratio. In other words, increasing the share of wind
turbines in large scale hybrid farms leads to lower cost per unit of pro­
duced electricity. It should also be noted that LCOE is not very sensitive
to size variation of hybrid farm and it only changes 0.01 $ per kWh. For
50 MW farms and larger the PV ratio drops below 5 %, meaning that PV
panels act as back up for large scale power plants.
3.3. Land cost: What is the best strategy for higher priced lands?
The average land prices have a direct effect on LCOE and economic
justifiability of the farm (Fig. 7).
In this study, the possible points are locations that are suitable from
geographical and meteorological points of views, but land prices cannot
be investigated in large scale studies, since many different factors like
economic stability and landowner’s willingness to sell are involved.
For the base value, price of 1 m2 of land is assumed and calculations
and suggested configuration are carried out. In this part, GE, LCOE, PV
ratio, and Land use are analyzed for different land prices.
For locations with higher land prices, LCOE increases with a constant
slope. As the cost of lands rises, more PV panels should be used in order
to mitigate the land cost effect on LCOE. Wind turbines occupy more
spaces and that is why PV ratio rises for more expensive land to avoid
very high LCOE and keep the farm economically justifiable. A higher PV
ratio leads to less generated energy and land use.
3.4. Policy-making: How to utilize this study?
Iran is a vast country with high potentials for both solar and wind
farm installation. Although there are numerous locations that are suit­
able for hybrid farm installations, the land price is relatively high in the
country due to economic instability. As reported by [70], the average
price of each square meter of land in the capital city is $354.6.
Considering a lower price for other cities and locations still shows a high
price for land costs.
Furthermore, based on the report of Renewable energy organization
of Iran [71], only 0.6 % of total generated energy in the country is
produced by renewable energy sources. PV and wind farms installed
capacity is around 519 MW and 332 MW, respectively.
Based on the fact that fossil energy produced in Iran is heavily sub­
sidized by the government, installation of large-scale hybrid farms in
possible locations with equal weight for LCOE and generated energy not
only can reduce fossil energy dependency, but it also provides the
country with the opportunity to reduce its environmental emissions.
Table 6 shows the average generated energy, LCOE, PV ratio and land
use for installation of 50 MW hybrid farm in each of possible locations
with average land cost of $200 and equal weights for objective functions
in MCDM.
Based on the result of this study, there are only 696 locations in the
whole country which have been found suitable for PV-wind hybrid farm
establishment. These locations are mainly located in east-north and
west-northern parts of the country, which usually are not densely
R. Fardi Asrami et al. Energy Conversion and Management: X 20 (2023) 100490

Fig. 5. Effect of LCOE weight variation on (a) average GE, (b) average LCOE, (c) PV ratio, and (d) Land use.

Fig. 6. Changes in the nomical capacity by variation of (a) average GE, (b) average LCOE, (c) PV ratio, and (d) Land use.

populated. Based on the discussed points in sections 3.1, 3.2, and 3.3,
Table 7 could be presented as an explicit policy-recommendation for
stakeholders. This table has been provided by considering farms with
nominal capacity above 30 MW as large-scale farms and land prices
above $ 30 per m2 as expensive lands.
4. Conclusion
This study aimed at answering three questions about hybrid PV-wind
farms, which were 1. Why hybrid farms should be used?, 2. What would
be the best location to deploy them?, and 3. What is the best condition to
install them? A GIS approach was employed to eliminate unsuitable
locations for installation of hybrid PV-wind farms based on socio-
economic, terrain, and meteorological restrictions. Remaining

8
R. Fardi Asrami et al. Energy Conversion and Management: X 20 (2023) 100490

Fig. 7. Changes in the land cost by variation of (a) average GE, (b) average LCOE, (c) PV ratio, and (d) Land use.

• Although southern parts of Iran receive more annual average radi­

Table 6
ation, the possible points are mostly located on northern-east and
Results of the suggested strategy for case study.
northern-west parts of the country. This can be justified by the fact
GE (GWh.year− 1) LCOE ($.kWh− 1) PV ratio (%) Land use (m2) that southern part of the country has lower average wind speed, and
288.5339 0.326026 4.15 2,362,334 higher average temperature which would affect the modified effi­
ciency of the panels.
• It is up to the stakeholders to decide the weight of objective function
Table 7 for the optimal establishment of hybrid farm. If the farm is estab­
Policy-recommendation based on the obtained results of this study. lished in a location with high demand where quantity of generated
energy is more important than producing cheap energy, weight of
Expensive lands Cheap lands
LCOE should decrease in the developed code. Otherwise, higher
Cheap energy Small-scale hybrid farm with Large-scale hybrid farm LCOE weight would create a set-up where cheaper energy is
production high PV-ratio with high PV-ratio
High energy Small-scale hybrid farm with Large-scale hybrid farm
produced.
production low PV-ratio with low PV-ratio
CRediT authorship contribution statement

locations were considered possible points for installation. Energy and
economic modelling of the farm was carried out, while calculating the
optimal spacing between PV panels and wind turbines to avoid occu­
pying unnecessary land. Generated energy and LCOE were calculated as
energy and economic objective functions for MCDM. A computer code
was developed to find the best layout for hybrid farm, calculating the
generated energy, LCOE, PV ratio, and land use for each location. The
code used the GIS data and wind turbine and PV panel models as the
inputs to find the best configuration for each possible location. The most
important findings of the work could be itemized as follows:
• Land prices are very important in the scale of the hybrid farm and
configuration of panels and turbines. As the land prices increase,
smaller scale farms with higher PV ratio are recommended to make
up for the land costs.
• For cheaper areas, large-scale farms with less PV ratio produce more
energy with lower LCOE.
Reza Fardi Asrami: Conceptualization, Methodology, Investigation,
Software, Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing, Visuali­
zation. Ali Sohani: Conceptualization, Investigation, Methodology,
Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing. Mona Zamani
Pedram: Methodology, Writing – review & editing. Hoseyn Sayyaadi:
Methodology, Writing – review & editing.
Declaration of Competing Interest
The authors declare that they have no known competing financial
interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence
the work reported in this paper.
Data availability
Data will be made available on request.

9
R. Fardi Asrami et al. Energy Conversion and Management: X 20 (2023) 100490

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