Optimal Sizing of Solar Panel and Battery Storage for A Smart Aquaponic System

More attention has been given to developing a smart aquaponic system in recent years, mainly due to the shortage of food supplies and limited area for agriculture. The smart aquaponic system consists of internet of things (IoT) technology to enable continuous monitoring and autonomous operation. This, however, leads to higher power consumption as compared to the traditional system. Alternatively, the availability of solar resources in tropical countries, such as Malaysia can be utilized to reduce power consumption of the smart aquaponic system. Therefore, this study aims to determine the optimal size of a photovoltaic (PV) system to accommodate the power consumption. This study involves the development of the smart aquaponic using an IoT monitoring and control system. Then, a data logger is developed to collect the power consumption of the smart aquaponic system and measure the available solar energy resources in the area. After that, an optimal size of the PV system can be determined from the collected data. The results show that a 25 W solar panel with a 10 Ah lithium-ion battery is enough to accommodate the developed small-scale smart aquaponic system. It is clearly shown that an accurate size of the PV system for a particular aquaponic system at the identified installation site can be determined using the proposed approach.