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Technical and economic viability of a wind farm installed in a windy area of Algerian western south region

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Abstract

This paper presents a technical–economic study of a wind farm with a capacity of 40.04 MW located in the southwestern part of Algeria, precisely at Aoulef region in Adrar. The selection of sites was based on the information gathered through the Algerian Atlas wind map and also through the geographical information system (GIS). This one helps to manipulate a large number of geographical data, GIS allows to select optimal wind farm locations on the mesoscale coverage, best locations of wind turbine generators on the microscale coverage was conducted by a strong wind software tools. The results demonstrate that the wind farm with the capacity of 40.04 MW, comprising 13 wind turbine generators, each one with the capacity of 3.08 MW implemented in site 2, is the most profitable in terms of cost and efficiency. The gross annual production of this wind farm is 87,300 MWh, but if we take into consideration the wake losses, energy losses on energy transport, and distribution lines as well as mandatory downtime, we get an annual net production of 82,935 MWh, which corresponds to a levelized cost of energy of 8.46 DA/kWh.

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Abbreviations

A :

Scale factor, m/s

AEP:

Annual energy production, GWh

F t :

Fuel expenditure

\( \hat{C}_{n} \) :

After-tax cash flow in year n

N :

Project life in years

P :

Available power density, W/m2

U :

Average wind speed, m/s

k :

Shape factor

n :

Lifetime of the project, years

r :

Discount rate for the project

CAPEX:

Capital expenditures

CF:

Capacity factor

DA/kWh:

Algerian Dinar per kilowatt-hours

DEM:

Digital elevation model

GH WindFarmer:

Garrad Hassan WindFarmer software

G.I.S:

Geographic Information System

IRR:

Internal rate of return

LCOE:

Levelized cost of energy

MDA:

Millions of Algerian Dinar

NPV:

Net present value

ONM:

National Office of Meteorology

OPEX:

Operation expenditures

SRTM:

Shuttle radar topography mission

a.g.l:

Above ground level

Sonelgaz:

National Society of Electricity and Gas

WasP:

Wind energy industry-standard software

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank the UDES/CDER and the CEEG.spa/Sonelgaz for their support of this study.

Funding

This study was carried out as part of a master’s degree in renewable energy. The authors state that they have received no funding to conduct this study.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Département Energie Renouvelable, Faculté des Sciences, Université de Blida, Blida, Algeria

    Fateh Bennaceur & Mustapha Merzouk

  2. Compagnie de l’Engineering de l’Electricité et du Gaz (CEEG.spa/Sonelgaz), Alger, Algeria

    Fateh Bennaceur

  3. Unité de Développement des Equipements Solaires, UDES, Centre de Développement des Energies Renouvelables, CDER, 42004, W. Tipaza, Algeria

    Nachida Kasbadji Merzouk

  4. Département Mécanique, Faculté des Sciences, Université de Blida, Blida, Algeria

    Ahmed Hadji

Authors
  1. Fateh Bennaceur
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  2. Nachida Kasbadji Merzouk
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  3. Mustapha Merzouk
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  4. Ahmed Hadji
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Nachida Kasbadji Merzouk.

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Bennaceur, F., Kasbadji Merzouk, N., Merzouk, M. et al. Technical and economic viability of a wind farm installed in a windy area of Algerian western south region. Euro-Mediterr J Environ Integr 4, 7 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s41207-018-0088-3

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s41207-018-0088-3

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