Microgrid cost optimization for a mixed-use building

Abstract

Nationally, there has been significant movement to mixed-use buildings. This work investigates the effect of a mixed commercial and residential building load on the optimal sizing of a renewable energy resource (RER) microgrid. The RER system consists of solar panels, wind turbines, battery storage, and a backup diesel generator, and it is isolated from conventional grid power. The building contains a single restaurant and 12 residential apartments. Historical meter readings and commercial-kitchen modeling represent the apartments and restaurant, respectively. TMY3 data determines hourly RER power, and a dispatching algorithm predicts power flows between system elements. A genetic algorithm approach minimizes total annual cost over the number of solar panels and micro-turbines, battery capacity, and diesel generator size, with a constraint on the renewable penetration. Results indicate that load-mixing serves to reduce cost, and the reduction is largest if the diesel backup is removed from the system.