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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SUSTAINABLE ENERGY 1

An Improved Optimal Sizing Method for

Wind-Solar-Battery Hybrid Power System
Lin Xu, Xinbo Ruan, Senior Member, IEEE, Chengxiong Mao, Senior Member, IEEE, Buhan Zhang, and Yi Luo

Abstract—This paper proposes an improved optimal sizing STD Standard deviation.

method for wind-solar-battery hybrid power system (WSB-HPS), Instantaneous and average power
considering the system working in stand-alone and grid-con-
injected into grid.
nected modes. The proposed method is based on the following
principles: a) high power supply reliability; b) full utilization of Power fluctuation rate.
the complementary characteristics of wind and solar; c) small Initial investment cost of distributed
fluctuation of power injected into the grid; d) optimization of generator.
the battery’s charge and discharge state; e) minimization of the Prices of PV array, wind turbine, and
total cost of system. Compared with the traditional methods, the
proposed method can achieve a higher power supply reliability
battery.
while require less battery capacity in stand-alone mode. And in Number of PV array, wind turbine,
grid-connected mode, the optimization strategy based on energy and battery
filter is further utilized to achieve the optimal battery capacity. Capital recovery factor.
Thus, the proposed method can achieve a much smaller fluctuation Real interest rate.
of power injected into the grid. In addition, the battery’s charge
and discharge state can be optimized thanks to the consideration Project lifetime of the hybrid power
of the battery’s depth of discharge (DOD), the charge/discharge system.
current, rate and cycles, which will prolong the battery’s lifetime. Fixed operating and maintenance
A case study of WSB-HPS located in Hohhot, China is presented cost of PV, WPG, and battery.
to verify the advantages of the proposed optimal sizing method. Replacement cost of PV array, wind
Index Terms—Energy filter, fluctuation of power injected into turbine, and battery.
the grid, optimal sizing method, power supply reliability, wind- Cost of purchasing power from the
solar-battery hybrid power system. grid and selling power to the grid.
Price of selling power to the grid and
purchasing power from the grid.
NOMENCLATURE Energy selling to the grid and
purchasing from the grid.
Derating factor. Penalty cost.
Temperature coefficient of power. Penalty cost for capacity shortage
Demand power of load. and power fluctuation.
Output power of wind turbine and Allowable loss of power supply
PV panel. probability of load.
Daily energy consumed by load. Actual and allowable fluctuation of
power injected into the grid.
Discharge and charge power of Area, length, and width of the given
battery. region for wind turbine.
Power supplied by the grid. Rotor diameter of wind turbine.
Power injected into the grid. Area of the given region for PV panel
Number of sampling data points. and battery.
Average power of load. Area of single PV panel and battery
required for installation.
Relative fluctuation rate Coefficient considering the possible
shadow area in the given region.
Capacity and voltage of single
Manuscript received May 22, 2012; revised June 24, 2012, September 12,
2012; accepted October 27, 2012. This work was supported by the National battery.
Natural Science Foundation of China (50837003) and by the National Basic Discharge efficiency of the battery.
Research Program of China (2009CB219706).
The authors are with the State Key Laboratory of Advanced Electromag-
Total output power of distributed
netics Engineering and Technology, Huazhong University of Science and Tech- generator.
nology, Wuhan, Hubei Province, China (e-mail: xulin1988@smail.hust.edu.cn; Operating reserve ratio.
ruanxb@mail.hust.edu.cn).
Color versions of one or more of the figures in this paper are available online Charge and discharge rate.
at http://ieeexplore.ieee.org. Limited charge and discharge rate.
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TSTE.2012.2228509

1949-3029/$31.00 © 2013 IEEE

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2 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SUSTAINABLE ENERGY
Charge and discharge current.
Maximum charge and discharge
current.
Charge and discharge power.
Maximum charge and discharge
power.
Battery’s charge/discharge cycles
and its limited value.
Maximum and minimum allowable
power exchanging between
WSB-HPS and grid.
Reference value of the relative
fluctuation rate.
Maximum power fluctuation rate that
the grid can bear.
I. INTRODUCTION
W ITH the global environmental pollution and energy
crisis, distributed power generation system (DPGS)
based on renewable energy, such as photovoltaic (PV) and
wind power generation (WPG), is playing a more and more
important role in energy production. However, the output
power of PV and WPG are usually strongly fluctuant due to
the randomness and intermittence of solar and wind energy,
which requires a large capacity of energy storage to satisfy the
load demand when the system works in stand-alone mode, and
results in a strong impact on the utility grid when the system
works in grid-connected mode [1]–[3]. This problem can be
partially overcome by utilizing the hybrid wind-solar power
system thanks to the complementary characteristics of wind
and solar energy [4]. A reasonable size of PV/WPG/battery can
not only improve the power supply reliability, but also reduce
the cost of the system.
For stand-alone WSB-HPS, many optimal sizing methods
have been proposed, which can be divided into single-objective
[5]–[8] and multi-objective optimal sizing methods [9], [10].
For single-objective optimal sizing methods, minimizing the
system cost is the optimization object with the precondition
of satisfying the requirement of power supply reliability. The
optimization process can be realized by means of enumerative
method, lineal programming method, iterative algorithms, or
genetic algorithms (GA). For multi-objective optimal sizing
methods, maximizing the power supply reliability and mini-
mizing the system cost are the main optimization objectives,
which can be carried out by multi-objective evolutionary
algorithms (MOEA). Environmental benefit is usually taken
into account, and thus minimizing the equivalent pollutant
emissions of the hybrid system is one more objective [9], [10].
For grid-connected WSB-HPS, the existing optimal sizing
methods are actually based on the stand-alone system with the
grid being regarded as a backup power [11]–[14]. Namely, the
system can purchase power from the grid to ensure the load de-
mand. Considering that purchasing power from the grid will af-
fect the environmental benefits of the system, minimizing the
power purchasing from the grid is also an optimization objec-
tive [11], or the maximum power purchasing from the grid is
limited [12], [13].
In the above mentioned methods, although the power supply
reliability and system cost are characterized by different eval-
uation indices and the optimization process is realized by dif-
ferent algorithms, these optimal sizing methods are essentially
the same, i.e., the optimal size of PV/WPG/battery is obtained
by minimizing the system cost while satisfying the requirement
of power supply reliability. This type of optimal sizing strategy
is defined as traditional optimal sizing methods in this paper.
However, there are several factors that have not been consid-
ered in the traditional optimal sizing methods, which are listed
in the following.
• The operating reserve capacity, the battery’s charge/dis-
charge current, the charge/discharge rate and the
charge/discharge cycles. The operating reserve capacity
can provide a safety margin that helps ensure reliable
power supply of the WSB-HPS while the battery’s
charge/discharge current, rate and cycles can seriously
affect the battery’s lifetime [15].
• How to fully utilize the complementary characteristics of
wind and solar. Fully utilizing the complementary charac-
teristics of wind and solar can significantly reduce the fluc-
tuation of output power.
• How to smooth the fluctuation of power injected into the
grid in grid-connected mode. A strongly fluctuant power
injected into the grid will impact on the utility grid [3].
This paper proposes an improved optimal sizing method for
WSB-HPS, which takes the above three factors into account,
and a more accurate and reasonable optimal sizing model is built
considering the system working in stand-alone and grid-con-
nected modes. In the traditional methods, the power supply re-
liability and system cost are paid more attention to. However,
fully utilizing the complementary characteristics of WPG/PV
and smoothing the fluctuation of power injected into the grid are
also the objectives to be pursued besides ensuring high power
supply reliability and expecting a minimum system cost in the
proposed method. Moreover, optimizing the battery’s charge/
discharge state can also be realized in the proposed method.
This paper is organized as follows. The energy management
and optimal sizing principles of the WSB-HPS are introduced in
Section II. Then the optimal sizing methodology is presented es-
pecially in Section III. And a case study of WSB-HPS located in
Hohhot, China is presented to verify the advantages of the pro-
posed optimal sizing method in Section IV. Finally, Section V
concludes this paper.
II. ENERGY MANAGEMENT AND OPTIMIZATION PRINCIPLES
According to the connection bus, the network architecture of
WSB-HPS can be classified into three types: dc-bus, ac-bus,
and hybrid-bus, among which, the dc-bus architecture has been
widely used in small-scale DPGS for its convenient control and
interface of renewable energy to the system [16]. In this paper,
the dc-bus architecture, as shown in Fig. 1, is chosen. In the
figure, the PV panel and wind turbine are connected to the dc
bus by the dc/dc and ac/dc converters, respectively, which can
realize the maximum power point tracking (MPPT) function.
The battery cells are connected to the dc bus via a bidirection
dc/dc converter in a concentrated location, which are used to
control the dc bus voltage. Please note that the storage system
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XU et al.: IMPROVED OPTIMAL SIZING METHOD FOR WSB-HPS 3

Fig. 3. Concept of the kinetic battery model.

in Fig. 3. The first tank contains “available energy,” which is

Fig. 1. DC-bus based WSB-HPS.
Fig. 2. Output power curve of wind turbine.
is composed of many battery modules connected in series or par-
allel. The balance circuits among different modules are usually
included in the system. The dc voltage is converted to ac voltage
through an inverter. The power generated by WSB-HPS pro-
vides the demanded power for the local load and can be trans-
ferred into the utility grid through a step-up transformer.
readily available for conversion to dc electricity. The second
tank contains “bound energy,” which is chemically bound and
therefore not immediately available for release.
Three parameters are used to describe this two-tank system,
which are determined from the battery’s capacity curve. The
maximum battery capacity is the total amount of energy
the two tanks can contain. The capacity ratio is the ratio of
the size of the available energy tank to the combined size of both
tanks. The rate constant relates to the conductance between
the two tanks, which is a measure of how quickly the battery
can convert bound energy to available energy.
The available and bound energy (kWh) at each time step are
described as
(3)

A. Mathematical Model of the Components in WSB-HPS (4)

1) Photovoltaic Generation Model: Assuming that the PV
array is equipped with a MPPT controller, thus, the output power
of PV array can be expressed as (5)

(1) where and are the available energy and

bound energy at the beginning and at the end of the time step,
where is the rated output power of PV array, is the de- respectively. is the power into (positive) or out of (negative)
rating factor considering shading, wiring losses and snow cover, the battery bank, is the time step.
etc. and are the solar radiation and temperature on The maximum charge and discharge power
PV cell under standard test conditions, respectively. and at each time step are described as
are the solar radiation and temperature in current time, respec-
tively, and is the temperature coefficient of power. (6)
It should be noted that the PV panel title angle, rotating capa-
bility, et al. can also affect the output power of PV array beside
and . In this study, these factors are taken into account when
calculating the solar radiation on PV panel. (7)
2) Wind Power Generation Model: Fig. 2 shows the output
power curve of the wind turbine (WT), which can be described The battery’s terminal voltage is expressed as
as (8)

where is the internal resistance, is the discharge current,

(2) and is the effective internal voltage, which is modeled by

where is the wind speed, is the rated wind speed, and
are the cut-in and cut-out wind speeds, respectively,
is the rated output power of wind turbine.
3) Battery Model: The kinetic battery model (KiBaM) is
adopted here to calculate the amount of energy that can be ab-
sorbed by or released from the battery bank at each time step
[17]. The KiaBM is based on the concepts of electrochemical
kinetics, modeling a battery as a two-tank system as shown
(9)
where is fully charged/discharged internal battery voltage
(after the initial transient), reflects the initial linear variation
of internal battery voltage with state of charge (SOC), and
reflect the decrease/increase of battery voltage when battery is
progressively discharged/charged, is normalized maximum
capacity at the given current. All the variables in (9) can be
achieved from the battery’s charge and discharge curves [18].
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4 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SUSTAINABLE ENERGY

B. Energy Management Strategy of WSB-HPS III. OPTIMAL SIZING METHODOLOGY FOR WSB-HPS
When WSB-HPS works in stand-alone mode, if the total
A. Evaluation Indices in the Proposed Method
power generated by PV and WPG is less than the load demand,
, the battery will be discharged. The power flow is ex- Four evaluation indices are proposed to characterize the op-
pressed as timization performance of WSB-HPS.
1) Power Supply Reliability: The loss of power supply prob-
(10) ability (LPSP) of the load is chosen to evaluate the power supply
reliability of the hybrid power system, which is defined as
If the total power generated by PV and WPG is more than the
load demand, the excess power will charge the battery. The
power flow is expressed as

(11)

After the battery is fully charged, the excess power will be

(14)
dumped or the PV panel and wind turbine will withdraw from
MPPT state.
where is the operating time of the hybrid system. In
When working in grid-connected mode, the WSB-HPS has
this study, the operating time is chosen to be 8760 hours, i.e.,
the priority in satisfying the load demand over that provided by
the daily operating time is 24 hours. Thus is equal to 8760.
the utility grid. If the WSB-HPS can not produce enough power
A LPSP of 0 means the load is always satisfied, and a LPSP of
to satisfy the load demand, the shortage power will be supplied
1 means that the load is never satisfied.
by the grid. The power supplied by the grid, , is expressed
2) Complementary Characteristics of Wind and Solar: This
as
paper adopts the fluctuation rate of the total output of WPG and
(12) PV relative to the load power to characterize whether the system
makes full use of the complementary characteristics of wind and
If the total power generated by PV and WPG is more than the solar. The relative fluctuation rate, , is defined as
load demand, the surplus power has the priority in charging the
battery, and then is injected into the grid. The power injected
(15)
into the grid, , is expressed as

(13)
where is the average power of load.
It is obvious that the smaller is, the closer the output of
WPG and PV is to the load power. Thus, a less battery capacity
C. Optimal Sizing Principles of WSB-HPS
is required and the battery’s charge/discharge cycles and DOD
According to (10) and (11), for a given load demand, fully are reduced. In other words, a smaller means a better uti-
utilizing the complementary characteristics of wind and solar lization of the complementary characteristics of WPG and PV.
can achieve a smaller fluctuation of output power, which results 3) The Fluctuation of Power Injected Into the Grid: The
in a reduction of the required battery capacity. standard deviation (STD) and power fluctuation rate, , are
According to (12) and (13), it is obvious that there exists used here to characterize the fluctuation of power injected into
power exchange between the WSB-HPS and utility grid in grid- the grid, which are defined as
connected mode. A strongly fluctuant power injected into the
grid may lead to the voltage or frequency at key nodes exceeding
their limitation and large losses [2]–[4]. Thus, how to smooth (16)
the fluctuation of power injected into the grid must be taken into
account when optimizing the capacity of PV/WPG/battery. (17)
In addition, the lifetime of WSB-HPS is usually restricted by
the lifetime of the battery, which is mainly affected by the bat- where and are the instantaneous and average power
tery’s DOD, the charge/discharge current, the charge/discharge injected into the grid, respectively. and are the
rate and the charge/discharge cycles [15]. Thus, these factors maximum and minimum power injected into the grid during
must be considered. time interval , respectively. The smaller STD and are,
According to the analysis above, the proposed optimal sizing the smaller the power fluctuation is.
method is based on the following principles: a) achieving high STD and are suitable for long-term and short-term eval-
power supply reliability; b) making full use of the complemen- uation of the power fluctuation, respectively. With the two in-
tary characteristics of wind and solar; c) ensuring a small fluctu- dices, the fluctuation characteristics of power injected into the
ation of power injected into the grid; d) optimizing the battery’s grid can be well described.
charge and discharge state; and e) minimizing the total cost of 4) Total Cost of WSB-HPS: The cost of WSB-HPS includes
WSB-HPS. the following parts:
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XU et al.: IMPROVED OPTIMAL SIZING METHOD FOR WSB-HPS 5

a) The initial investment cost of the distributed generator where is the penalty cost for capacity shortage
(DG), , defined as ($/kW), is the penalty cost for power fluctuation
($/%), is the allowable LPSP of the load, and
(18) are the actual and allowable fluctuation of power injected
where are the prices of PV array, wind tur- into the grid, respectively.
bine, and battery, respectively, and are the Thus, the total cost of WSB-HPS is expressed as
number of PV array, wind turbine and battery, respec- (25)
tively, and is the capital recovery factor used to cal-
culate the present value [8], which is defined as It should be noted that the government’s subsidy or credit is
also an important part when analyzing the economy of a renew-
(19) able energy system. And the cost model in this paper will be
more accurate and reasonable if considering the government’s
where is real interest rate and is the project lifetime. subsidy or credit.
It should be noted that the converter cost is also included
in (18). B. Constraints in the Proposed Optimal Sizing Method
b) The operating and maintenance cost, , defined as 1) Maximum Installed Capacity of DG: The maximum in-
stalled capacity of DG is constrained by the installed area. Usu-
(20) ally, the interval between two wind turbines must be 6–10 times
of the rotor diameter in the direction of prevailing wind and
where and are the operating
3–5 times of the rotor diameter in the vertical direction of pre-
and maintenance cost of PV, WPG, and battery per unit
vailing wind. Thus, for a region with its area , length , and
time, respectively. and are the operating time
width , the maximum installed number of wind turbines, ,
of PV, WPG and battery, respectively.
is defined as
c) The replacement cost, (relevant only if the project
lifetime exceeds the DG lifetime), defined as (26)
(21)
where is the integral function, representing the maximum
where and are the replacement cost integer less than , and is the rotor diameter.
of PV array, wind turbine, and battery, respectively. It Similarly, the maximum installed number of PV array
should be noted that the replacement cost of the converters and battery are constrained as
is also included in (21).
d) The cost of power exchanging between the WSB-HPS and (27)
grid, including the cost of purchasing power from the grid (28)
and the cost of selling power to the grid , which
where and are the given area for installation of PV panel
are defined as
and battery, respectively. and are the area of single PV
(22) panel and battery required for installation, respectively, is
(23) a coefficient, considering the possible shadow area in the given
region.
where and are the price of selling power to 2) Minimum Installed Capacity of DG: In this study, fully
the grid and purchasing power from the grid, respectively, utilizing the renewable energy and minimizing the battery’s
and are the energy selling to the grid and charge/discharge cycles are expected. Thus, the installed PV
purchasing from the grid, respectively. panels and wind turbines should at least provide the average
e) A loss of power supply or a strongly fluctuant power in- load demand during the normal weather. That is to say, the
jected into the grid will increase the regulation cost of the installed PV panels should at least provide the average load
utility grid. Thus, the penalty cost is considered when demand during the daytime when there is no or weak wind.
the power supply reliability or the fluctuation of power in- And the installed wind turbines are expected to provide the
jected into the grid can not meet the requirements. is average load demand at night if there is enough wind. If there
defined as is no illumination, no wind or weak wind, the battery should
guarantee the load to work at least days.
Therefore, the minimum installed number of wind turbine,
PV array and battery are determined by

- (29)

% (30)
-
(24) (31)
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6 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SUSTAINABLE ENERGY

where – and – are the effective operating time 6) Performance Constraint: As previous mentioned, the pro-
of PV panels in the daytime and wind turbines at night, respec- posed method is expected to achieve higher power supply reli-
tively, is the daily energy consumed by the load, and ability, a better utilization of the complementary characteristics
are the capacity and voltage of single battery, respectively, of WPG and PV, a smaller fluctuation of power injected into the
and is discharge efficiency of the battery. grid and a minimum system cost. This can be realized by multi-
3) Operating Reserve Capacity of WSB-HPS: Operating re- objective optimization method. Another realization method is to
serve is the surplus operating capacity that can instantly respond choose one of the four objectives as the final optimization ob-
to a sudden increase in the load or a sudden decrease in the re- jective, and the other three as the further constraints.
newable power output, which is expressed as In this study, minimizing the system cost is chosen as the final
optimization objective while the former three are considered as
% (32) the performance constraints.
LPSP is used to characterize the power supply reliability.
where is the total output power of DG and is the oper- Usually LPSP is only necessary to satisfy
ating reserve ratio. In this study, 10% of the load power is taken
as the reserve capacity, i.e., %. (39)
4) Battery Charge and Discharge Constraints: In order to
optimize the battery’s charge and discharge state during the where is the allowable LPSP of the load.
energy conversion, the following constrains are taken into If the relative fluctuation rate is less than the reference
consideration in the proposed method: a) the battery’s state of value , i.e.
charge (SOC) can not be less than ; b) the charge rate
and discharge rate cannot exceed the limited value (40)
and , respectively; c) the charge and discharge cur-
rent and cannot exceed the maximum value and the hybrid power system is regarded to have fully utilized the
, respectively; d) the charge and discharge power complementary characteristics of wind and solar.
and are within the maximum value, and STD and are utilized to characterize the fluctuation of
; e) the battery’s charge/discharge cycles cannot power injected into grid. STD is expected to be as small as pos-
exceed the limited value , in a scheduling period, where sible. However, is only necessary to be within the tolerance
is defined as follows: will add once when the battery is of the grid, i.e.
charged from one state (i.e., %
to full state (i.e., %) and then discharged to the (41)
same state (i.e., SOC: % ).
According to the principles above, the battery’s charge and where is the maximum power fluctuation rate that the grid can
discharge state is constrained as follows: bear. According to [19], [20], the maximum cannot exceed
33% of the installed capacity in 10 minutes.

(33) C. Objective Function

(34)
Minimizing the total cost of WSB-HPS is chosen as the final
(35)
objective function, which is expressed as

(36) (42)
(37)
It should be noted that (42) is a universal objective function.
where and can be ob- Only if both (39) and (41) are satisfied, the penalty cost
tained from the manufacturer, and and will be zero. Otherwise, the penalty cost can not be ignored. It
can be calculated according to the battery’s model is obvious that the penalty cost will be paid using the traditional
[17], [18]. methods because the fluctuation of power injected into grid is
When the constrains (33)–(37) are satisfied during energy not considered in the optimal sizing model.
conversion, the battery’s charge and discharge state will be op-
timized and the battery’s lifetime will be prolonged. D. Optimal Sizing Strategy
5) Power Exchanging Between WSB-HPS and the Grid: The
power exchanging between the WSB-HPS and grid, , must According to (26)–(32), the probable capacity combinations
satisfy of WPG/PV/battery can be obtained. Thus, the optimal size of
WPG/PV/battery will be chosen in a finite sample space.
(38) 1) Optimal Sizing Strategy in Stand-Alone Mode: The op-
timal sizing strategy of the proposed method is described as
where and are the maximum and minimum al- follows.
lowable power exchanging between the WSB-HPS and grid, 1) According to the output models of PV/WPG/battery and
respectively. considering the battery’s charge and discharge constraints
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XU et al.: IMPROVED OPTIMAL SIZING METHOD FOR WSB-HPS 7

Fig. 4. Optimizing the battery capacity using energy filter.

[(33)–(37)], the LPSP and of every probable combina-

tion can be calculated.
2) According to (40), the capacity combinations of PV/WPG/
battery with better complementary characteristics can be
chosen.
3) The capacity combinations with LPSP satisfying (39) can
be chosen.
4) Finally, the optimal combination of PV/WPG/battery is
chosen with minimum system cost.
2) Optimal Sizing Strategy in Grid-Connected Mode: When
WSB-HPS works in grid-connected mode, the battery capacity
should be increased to smooth the fluctuation of power injected
into the grid. In the proposed method, the concept of energy
filter is applied to optimize the required battery capacity based
on full utilization of the complementary characteristics of wind
and solar.
The energy filter is utilized to separate the low-frequency
component and high-frequency component from the power in-
jected into the grid. The impact of the low-frequency component
on the grid can be ignored for its small fluctuation. The high-fre-
quency component should be compensated by the battery for its
high fluctuation [21]. In this way, the optimal size of the battery
can be obtained as shown in Fig. 4.
In fact, the energy filter is an algorithm, which can be realized
by a low-pass filter, such as

(43)
Fig. 5. Program flow chart of the proposed optimal sizing method.
where is the quality factor, is the cut-off frequency.
Applying the backward difference discretization method, the The high-frequency component of power injected into the
low-frequency component, , can be separated from the grid can be derived as
power injected into the grid before compensation , which
is expressed as (46)

(44) As aforementioned, the optimal sizing strategy in grid-con-

nected mode is described as follows.
1) Choosing the capacity combinations of PV/WPG with
where is the sampling period. Thus, the power injected into better complementary characteristics.
the grid after compensation at the kth time, can be 2) Choosing the capacity combinations of PV/WPG/battery,
obtained as shown in (45) at the bottom of the page, where whose LPSP satisfies (39).
the initial value of is defined as 3) Applying the energy filter, choosing the capacity combina-
. tions of PV/WPG/battery, whose satisfies (41).

(45)
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8 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SUSTAINABLE ENERGY

Fig. 6. Load curve. (a) Annual. (b) One day.

Fig. 7. Annual weather data of Hohhot. (a) Wind speed. (b) Illumination. (c) Temperature. (From: China Meteorological Data Sharing Service System).
TABLE I
MAIN PARAMETERS OF PV PANEL/WIND TURBINE/BATTERY. (FROM: WWW.SOLAR-PV.CN; WWW.ENERGIEPGE.COM; WWW.HOPPECKE.COM)

TABLE II
VALUE OF THE VARIABLES MENTIONED IN THE OPTIMIZATION MODEL

TABLE III
ALL COST OF THE HYBRID POWER SYSTEM

4) Choosing the optimal capacity combination of PV/WPG/
battery with the minimum cost.
The detailed program flow chart of the proposed optimal
sizing method is shown as Fig. 5.
IV. CASE STUDY RESULTS AND ANALYSIS
A case study of WSB-HPS located in Hohhot, China, is pre-
sented to verify the advantage of the proposed optimal sizing
method. The load with average power of 100 kW, peak power
of 315 kW, load factor of 33%, and the daily variation of %
is chosen as the local load of WSB-HPS, as shown in Fig. 6.
Fig. 7 shows the annual wind speed, illumination and temper-
ature curves. It should be noted that the influence of temper-
ature on the output of PV array is relatively small compared
with the illumination. Moreover, the change of the tempera-
ture is small during the operating time of PV array (usually
8:00 A.M.–17:00 P.M.). Thus, the monthly average temperature
is adopted as the daily average temperature. This will result in
error, but it is acceptable for optimizing the size of PV array. The
specification of wind turbine, PV panel and battery is shown in
Table I. Table II shows the values of the variables used in the op-
timization model. Table III shows all cost of the hybrid system.
It should be noted that the comparison of traditional and
proposed methods is focused on whether to consider full
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XU et al.: IMPROVED OPTIMAL SIZING METHOD FOR WSB-HPS 9

TABLE IV
COMPARISON OF CONFIGURATION RESULTS OF THE TWO OPTIMIZATION METHODS IN STAND-ALONE MODE

Fig. 9. Comparison of the probability of different SOC.

Fig. 10. Complementary characteristics of different capacity combina-

Fig. 8. Output power curve of PV and WPG. (a) Annual (Sampling a point tions of PV panel and wind turbine .
every day). (b) One day.

Fig. 9 shows the probability of different SOC. It can be seen

utilization of the complementary characteristics of wind and
solar, smoothing the fluctuation of power injected into the
grid and optimizing the battery’s charge/discharge state. Thus,
LPSP, and will be paid more attention to. For the
traditional methods, the optimization process can be completed
by HOMER software [22]. For the proposed method, LPSP and
are calculated by HOMER software while and are
calculated according to the dater exported by HOMER software.
Then, the optimal capacity combination of PV/WPG/battery is
obtained according to Fig. 5. It can be seen that the proposed
method may be more complex. However, this almost does not
affect the convergence rapidity of the optimization algorithm
due to that the proposed method chooses the optimal size of
PV/WPG/battery in a finite sample space. The calculation step
is 1 h and calculation period is 8760 h. The wind turbine and
PV array are assumed to work on the MPPT state.
A. Optimization Results in Stand-Alone Mode
Table IV shows the optimization results of the traditional and
proposed optimal sizing methods. Fig. 8 shows the output power
curve of PV and WPG. In Fig. 8(a), the point that equals to the
daily average output power of PV and WPG is chosen as the
daily sampling point. It can be seen that the proposed method
can achieve a smaller fluctuation of output power due to full uti-
lization of the complementary characteristics of wind and solar
(i.e., a smaller ). Thus, the proposed method can ensure a
high power supply reliability while require less battery capacity.
The total cost is a little higher using the proposed method due to
the high price of PV panel. But the cost per kWh of electricity
is nearly the same.
that by utilizing the proposed method, the probability of the bat-
tery’s deep discharge is lower.
Fig. 10 shows the complementary characteristics of different
capacity combinations of PV panel and wind turbine. It can be
seen that a better complementary characteristics of wind and
solar, i.e., a smaller , leads to a less battery capacity required
to ensure the power supply reliability.
According to the simulation results, it can be concluded that
the proposed optimal sizing method can achieve a high power
supply reliability while require less battery capacity. Besides,
the battery’s DOD and deep charge/discharge cycles can be re-
duced, which will prolong the battery’s lifetime.
B. Optimization Results in Grid-Connected Mode
When WSB-HPS switches to grid-connected mode, applying
the energy filter, the power injected into the grid after compen-
sation can be obtained.
The second-order low-pass filter as expressed in (43) is
chosen as the energy filter. It is obvious that the performance
of energy filter is affected by the sampling period , quality
factor , and cut-off frequency . In this study, the
simulation step is one hour. Thus, is chosen to be 1 h. is
usually chosen to be 0.707. Therefore, the performance of the
energy filter is mainly determined by .
Fig. 11 shows the power injected into the grid after compen-
sation for different value of .
Fig. 12 shows the power fluctuation rate . It can
be seen that the smaller is, i.e., the larger is, the better the
filtering performance is, which means the smaller the fluctua-
tion of power injected into the grid after compensation. Fig. 13
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10
Fig. 11. Power injected into the grid after compensation (one week).
Fig. 12. Fluctuation of power injected into the grid after using energy filter.
Fig. 13. Battery charge power curve after using energy filter.
Fig. 14. Relationship among STD, and .
shows the battery’ charge and discharge power curve. From this
curve, the required battery capacity can be calculated.
Fig. 14 shows the relationship among , STD,
the required battery capacity and . Fig. 15 shows the relation-
ship between the required battery capacity
in grid-connected mode and LPSP when switching to stand-
alone mode. Table V shows the comparison of different optimal
sizing methods. It can be seen that fully utilizing the comple-
mentary characteristics of wind and solar, i.e., a smaller , can
achieve a smaller fluctuation of power injected into the grid. But
the power fluctuation may still not satisfy (41). The application
of energy filter can further smooth the fluctuation of power in-
jected into the grid. It can be also seen that a smaller , i.e.,
a larger , means a larger battery capacity is required, which
results in a higher cost. Thus it is necessary to trade off between
the system cost and the fluctuation of power injected into the
grid. In this study, the optimal battery capacity is chosen for
minimizing the system cost while ensuring that the fluctuation
of power injected into the grid can meet the requirement (41).
According to this principle, the reasonable will be obtained.
With fully utilizing the complementary characteristics of
wind and solar, the installed capacity of PV and WPG are
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SUSTAINABLE ENERGY
Fig. 15. Relationship between, , LPSP and .
Fig. 16. The curve of power injected into the grid. (a) Annual. (b) One week.
450 kW and 455 kW, respectively. As described in (41), the
maximum fluctuation of power injected into the grid with
compensation can not exceed 33% of the installed capacity in
10 minutes. Considering the worst-case operating condition
that there is only wind or solar energy in one hour, if the
fluctuation of power injected into the grid can satisfy (47), it
will always meet the requirements in any case.
% %
(47)
From Table V, it can be seen that the fluctuation of power
injected into the grid can satisfy (47) when applying the energy
filter. However, it can not satisfy (47) if utilizing the traditional
methods. Thus, the penalty cost will be paid according to (24).
This is why the battery size in the sixth column is larger while
the cost is lower compared with that in the third column.
In conclusion, based on full utilization of the complementary
characteristics of wind and solar, the energy filter ( h) is
further utilized to achieve the optimal size of PV/WPG/battery.
In this way, the power supply reliability and the fluctuation of
power injected into the grid can meet the requirements while the
system cost is minimized.
Table VI shows optimization results in grid-connected mode.
Fig. 16 shows the curve of power injected into the grid. Fig. 17
shows the battery’s SOC after the application of energy filter.
It can be seen that the battery’s SOC never exceeds the lim-
ited value (35%) even though the batteries are not only used to
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XU et al.: IMPROVED OPTIMAL SIZING METHOD FOR WSB-HPS
TABLE V
COMPARISON OF THE PERFORMANCE INDICES UTILIZING DIFFERENT OPTIMIZATION STRATEGIES
TABLE VI
COMPARISON OF CONFIGURATION RESULTS OF THE TWO OPTIMIZATION METHODS ON GRID-CONNECTED MODE
Fig. 17. Battery’s SOC of the proposed method in grid-connected mode after
the application of energy filter (a) Annual. (b) One weak.
smooth the fluctuation of power injected into the grid, but also
ensure the power supply reliability of the load.
From the simulation results, it can be seen that the proposed
optimal sizing method has the following advantages:
1) The fluctuation of power injected into the grid is much
smaller thanks to full utilization of the complementary
characteristics of wind and solar and further application
of the energy filter.
2) With the same size of battery, the proposed method can
achieve higher power supply reliability, when switching
to stand-alone mode. This is due to fully utilization of the
complementary characteristics of wind and solar.
3) The total cost of WSB-HPS is lower.
V. CONCLUSION
In this paper, an improved optimal sizing method for wind-
solar-battery hybrid power system is proposed. Compared with
11
the traditional methods, the proposed method has several im-
provements as follows:
1) A more accurate and reasonable optimal sizing model is
built with the consideration of the required installation area
of DG and the operating reserve capacity of the system.
2) In stand-alone mode, the complementary characteristics of
wind and solar is fully utilized, which can achieve a smaller
fluctuation of output power. Thus, the battery’s capacity
can be reduced as well as the battery’s DOD and charge/
discharge cycles.
3) In grid-connected mode, the impact of power injected into
the grid on power quality of the utility grid is taken into
account. Based on full utilization of the complementary
characteristics of wind and solar, the energy filter is further
applied to smooth the fluctuation of power inject into the
grid. Thus, the optimal size of PV/WPG/battery can not
only ensure higher power supply reliability, but also ensure
a much smaller fluctuation of power injected into the grid.
4) The battery’s SOC, the charge/discharge current, the
charge/discharge rate and the charge/discharge cycles
are taken into consideration. Thus, the battery’s charge
and discharge state are optimized, which is helpful for
prolonging the battery’s lifetime.
Simulation results are presented to validate the advantages of
the proposed optimal sizing method.
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Lin Xu was born in Hubei, China, in 1988. He re-
ceived the B.S. degree from Huazhong University of
Science and Technology (HUST).
He is pursuing the M.S. degree from HUST. His
research includes the optimal sizing method of hybrid
power system and control of grid-connected inverter.
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON SUSTAINABLE ENERGY
Xinbo Ruan (M’97–SM’02) was born in Hubei
Province, China, in 1970. He received the B.S.
and Ph.D. degrees in electrical engineering from
Nanjing University of Aeronautics and Astronau-
tics (NUAA), Nanjing, China, in 1991 and 1996,
respectively.
In 1996, he joined the faculty of electrical engi-
neering teaching and research division, NUAA, and
he became a Professor in 2002 at the College of Au-
tomation Engineering, NUAA, where he has been en-
gaged in teaching and research in the field of power
electronics. From August to October 2007, he was a Research Fellow in the De-
partment of Electronics and Information Engineering, Hong Kong Polytechnic
University, Hong Kong, China. Since March 2008, he joined the Huazhong Uni-
versity of Science and Technology, China. His main research interests include
soft-switching dc/dc converters, soft-switching inverters, power factor correc-
tion converters, modeling the converters, power electronics system integration,
and renewable energy generation system. He has published over 130 technical
papers in journals and conferences and also published three books.
From 2005, he has served as Vice President of the China Power Supply So-
ciety, and from 2008, he has been the member of the Technical Committee on
Renewable Energy Systems within the IEEE Industrial Electronics Society. He
has also been an Associate Editor for the IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON INDUSTRIAL
ELECTRONICS since 2011. He is a Senior Member of the IEEE Power Electronics
Society and the IEEE Industrial Electronics Society.
Chengxiong Mao (SM’93) was born in Hubei,
China, in 1964. He received the B.S. and Ph.D.
degrees from Huazhong University of Science and
Technology (HUST) in 1984 and 1991, respectively.
His main research interests include the excitation
control of large synchronous generator, high power
electronic technology in power systems, fast algo-
rithms for large power systems, and the physical
simulation of power systems. He has published more
than 150 technical papers in journals and conferences
and also applied for more than 20 patents.
Buhan Zhang was born in Hubei, China, in 1950.
He received the B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees from
Huazhong University of Science and Technology
(HUST).
Presently, he is a Professor of HUST. He has pub-
lished more than 80 technical papers in journals and
conferences and also published four books. His main
research interests include power system analysis, dis-
tribution power system analysis, and energy storage
systems.
Yi Luo was born in Hubei, China, in 1966. He
received the B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. degrees from
Huazhong University of Science and Technology
(HUST).
Presently, he is an Associate Professor of HUST.
His main research interests include power system
analysis, energy management systems, and distribu-
tion power system.