Investigating the Impact of Solar Intermittency on the Storage System Lifetime in PV-Based Isolated Microgrids

Abstract

This article investigates the impact of daytime solar radiation variation caused by cloud shadows on the useful life of the storage system based on lead-acid batteries. The simulations are carried out using data collected from the microgrid of Ilha Grande - MA, with the charging/discharging process of the battery bank represented by the Schiffer model with an equalization period of seven days. The results show that short-duration intermittence has a significant impact on battery useful life. Ignoring this effect leads to gross errors in estimating the useful life of the battery banks and consequently in forecasting the O&M costs of the microgrid.