Optimization of Daily Operation of Micro Hydro
Power Plant Coupled with Compress Air Storage
Usama Bin Irshad*, M.S Javaid, Saifullah Shafiq, Md
Shafiul Alam, M.A Abido
Department of Electrical Engineering
King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals
Dhahran, Saudi Arabia
*usama.bin.irshad@gmail.com
Abstract—some areas lack access for electricity and grid
extension may not be economically feasible solution. Thus off-
grid technologies are normally the suitable options. Among the
off-grid technologies, micro hydro-power often matches local
conditions. However, the main problem with these micro power
plants is lack of significant storage capacity. This work proposes
the utilization of compress air storage to improve the run of the
river micro hydro power plant operational economic gains and
also increases its reliability. A generic hourly optimization
technique is developed to analyze the optimized daily operational
strategy followed by the hydro turbine and compressor motor
equipment provided that the forecasted load and water flow are
available. The plan of hydro plant situated at Dor River in
Pakistan is investigated and the optimization problem is solved
using AIMMS software. The obtained results are well presented
and discussed.
Keywords— Rural electrification, optimization, scheduling of
micro hydro plant
I. INTRODUCTION
Major population does not have the access to electricity due to
lack of latest techniques for power generation and that still
depend on traditional systems. In 2010, more than 1.27 billion
people in the world does not have access to electricity[1].
Previously in order to increase electricity access in remote
areas is extension of existing grid [1]. But these remote areas
have less load demand and investing in to provide electricity
by grid extinction is not economically feasible [2],[3]. In these
cases, standalone systems become the suitable option. Off grid
or stand alone is installed near to remote areas and fuel by
local resources. These kind of power station connect together
to form a separate small power system [4]. Among renewable-
based power generation techniques, if nature allows then
micro hydro-power plant, utilizing small rivers, is perfect fit
to supply power nearby areas [5], [6]. Moreover, Hydro
Power (M&SHP) is a preferable option as it is environmental
friendly and needs less maintenance and has negligible fueling
cost.
Run of the river (ROR) micro hydro power plant is consider
in this work, generation through ROR is totally depending on
the discharge of the water and it lacks the ability to store
water. On the day time, the quantity and flow of water
decreases due to water evaporation and use by locals while
demand is high. At night, in the off-peak hours there is excess
of water for generation but ROR does not have any reservoir
to store that water. To overcome the issue of storage, this
paper proposes to add a compressor facility with ROR hydro
power plant [5].
978-1-5090-4300-2/16/$31.00 ©2016 IEEE
Tahir Mumtaz
Department of Electrical Engineering
National University of Science and Technology
Rawalpindi, Pakistan
An axial turbine functions in the way of a cascaded set of
shrouded windmills, is used to generate electricity directly
from compress air. The blades of turbine act like blades of
windmills and with pressure at 22.4 atm and
cross-sectional area about 1.0 m2 flow speed of 1.75 m/s
yields a power of about 20 MW [7], [8]. This air storage
capability allows storing energy in depleted gas reservoir in
high water discharge period and to be used afterwards for
filling the power gap, it also helps in fulfilling the
commitment to meet local electricity demand. The proposed
algorithm also integrates the option to import power from grid
if needed. The ROR power plants can be installed after every
3 km on same river if conditions allow. In this formulation,
import power from grid means taking power from nearby
power plant.
In the present analysis, the forecasted data of load and
water discharge are determined. A daily operation scheme is
analyze by performing hourly based optimization. The
objective function is formulated in order to maximize the
daily profit of hydro plant. Active power output limits of
hydro turbines and compressors storage limits are explicitly
considered. Moreover, formulation also included the other
operational limitations like the storage capacity, maximum
and minimum discharge.
The proposed optimization technique is used to find the
daily optimal operational scheme of a combine hydro-
compressor power plant with a little compress air storage
capacity while defining the amount of power generation from
hydro and compressor. Hourly compressor power utilization
and the compressed air storage level profiles are also
incorporated in the formulation. In this formulation, only
active power generation is taken into account. However,
reactive power generation can also be added.
In this paper, an hourly-based discretize optimization
algorithm is proposed. The main purpose is to develop the
best hourly operational strategy followed by hydro generation
and compressed air storage, provided that the hourly
forecasting of water discharge and local electricity demand is
available. The develop methodology has two main objectives:
1) to increase the daily hydro plant profit and 2) to meet the
local load by keeping the generated power within its limits.
Obtaining the optimum daily operation schedule will decrease
the daily operating cost of the power plant hence significantly
increasing the overall profit.
II. Optimization Algorithm
The model is proposed by considering the controlling of
power production by hydro turbines assuring that the required
power is being supplied to the load whatever the water flow
is. To improve the output of the hydro generation through run
of the river, an air compressor system consisting of a motor
that compresses the air from atmosphere and store it in
depleted gas reservoir at a pressure of 20 atm is added which
generates the electricity up to few megawatts.
The main focus of this work is to increase profit by
optimizing the operation schedule. Problem is mathematically
formulated that maintained the power delivered to the local
load incorporating the limitation and operational restrictions
of the hydro plant in a discrete period of 24-hours and gives
the operational strategy for the following hours.
Fig. 1 Daily forecasted water discharge per hour in m /s
A. Input Data
In order to calculate the daily operation schedule, the
model needs some data as an input: forecasted local demand,
estimated active power prices, forecasted water flow
discharges and desired output limit curves. The daily
forecasted data of water discharge of Dor River is taken from
National Engineering Services Pakistan (Pvt.) limited
(NESPAK) which is shown in Figure 1. The load of nearby
village and COMSATS University (CIIT) is calculated by
survey which is shown in Figure 2.
Fig. 2 Daily forecasted load per hour in MW
B. Formulation
In this approach, coordination between compressor turbine
(axial turbine) and hydro power plant is developed to
minimize
the overall operating cost of the system while maximizing the
overall profit. So, an optimization problem was formulated
that maximized the profit through scheduling of output power
delivered to the load. The outcome of this optimization is the
operational strategy of compressor – hydro units for the next
hours. The overall objective function is descried below
Objective Function:
max π ∗ Pgen − ((a ∗ Ph) + (b ∗ Pc) + (c ∗ Pi)) (1)
s.t:
P =P +P +P
sto = sto + h η P −
( )
(3)
( )
P + P + P = Load (4)
P ≤P ≤P (5)
Q ≤Q ≤Q (6)
0 ≤ sto ≤ sto (7)
P ≤P ≤P (8)
P ≤P ≤P (9)
P ≤P ≤P (10)
where:
P Hourly power delivered from hydro generator
P Hourly power imported from spot market
P Hourly power supplied from compressor
Π Price of power per hour
sto Net storage in storage tank
Q Hourly discharge of water
The variables “a” and “b” in objective function are the
operating costs of the hydro and compressor generators and c
is the tariff of import power, where a=0.8, b=10, c=30. Eq. (2)
shows that a fraction of the available hydro power is right
away delivered to the load during the specific interval whereas
portion of generated power can be stored and delivered in
subsequent interval. Sometimes, the energy generated from
hydro cannot meet the load. In (3), P is the energy that
drives the motor to operate compressors.
In the proposed formulation, initial and the final level of the
compressed air storage is described. Initially the storage level
is taken as zero. The initial value of storage capacity is
known, it is the final value of the previous day but the final
value of current day is unknown and final value of current day
is rely on the operational strategy of the next day.
Output powers generated by hydro and compressor turbines
remains in a given upper and lower range as shown in (5) and
(8). These output limits represent the operational limitations
of the power plant usually associated with the thermal limits
of the generators or stability constraints if imposed in a certain
period of operation. Eqs. (5) to (10) describe the operation
limitations of the hydro-compressor generators, motor unit
and the storage capacity. The above formulation is the linear
optimization problems with 193 variables, 169 equality
constrains and 598 inequalities constrains. This problem is
solved using CPLEX 12.6.
The generation through run of the river hydro power plant
is mainly depending on the discharge rate of water. Hydro
generation also depend on the efficiency of the generator and
turbines, the density of the water, and the height from where
the water falls on the turbine. The speed of water reduces in
the penstock due to viscosity of water, friction of wall of
penstock, and due to trash rack. The reduction of speed affects
power generation. In this paper, the reduction of speed is
measured in terms of height loss in meters. This research
develops a generic mathematical model of penstock to find the
velocity loss of water in terms of head losses. In (11), it is
clear that the density of water, gross head, gravitational
constant, discharge of water, reduction of velocity of water in
(2) penstock and the efficiency of turbine and generator directly
affect the hydro generation. Eq. (11) is used to calculate the
power generation for specific hourly discharge of water.
The formula for generation through hydro is
P = ⍴GQ H − (H + H ) η η (11)
Where
H Gross head (m)
P Generation through Hydro in MW
ρ Density of Water
G Gravitational acceleration (9.81 m/s )
Q Discharge (m /s)
H Head loss due to friction
H Head loss due to trash rack
η Turbine efficiency
η Generator efficiency
In (11), the density of water is taken as 1,000 kg/m³ whereas
η ∗ η is 89.9%. In order to get accurate value of power
generated from hydro in (11), the loss of velocity and pressure
of water in the penstock have to be considered. The loss of
velocity of water is found in term of head loss using (12),
(14), and (15). After calculating the total head loss, now
calculate the total power generation from specific discharge of
water. Other parameters are given in Table I.
C. Head loss in penstock:
The height and the velocity of water give the potential
energy to it, which is known as its head. In (12), the
energy head is the water flowing in a closed conduit of
circular cross section, under a certain pressure, is given by
Bernoulli’s equation
H =h + + (12)
Where:
H Total energy head
H Elevation from datum plane
P Pressure
γ Specific weight of water in kN/m
V Velocity of water
The sum of the potential energy h , pressure energy P /y and
the kinetic energy V /2 gives velocity head and its shown in
equation (12). Here specific weight of water is 9.807 kN/m
and the total energy head H is 73.1 meters from datum.
In [9], Darcy and Weisbach applying the principle of
conservation of mass to volume of fluid in a pipe and derived
the following equation (13) for calculating loss of head due to
friction.
h =f . (13)
h Head loss due to friction of penstock
f Friction factor
L Length of the penstock in meter
D Diameter of Penstock in meter
V Average velocity m/s
In a laminar flow, friction factor (f) is defined as (14)
f = (14)
Where R is Reynolds number. When the flow is practically
turbulent (Re>2000), the friction factor becomes more rely on
the relative roughness of the pipe inner surface and pipe
diameter [9]. Here R = 2000 so the friction factor f is 0.032.
A screen is used at the entry of both pressure pipes to avoid
the entrance of floating debris. The flow of water through the
rack is quantify as a head loss [10]. It can be calculated by
Kirschmer formula so the head loss in trash rack is described
in (15)
h =K sin ∅ (15)
where
h Head loss (mm)
t Bar thickness (mm)
b Width between bars (mm)
V Approach velocity (m/s)
g Gravitational constant
φ Angle of inclination from horizontal surface
The thickness of bar has a major impact on head loss, in
this case t is 14 mm and the width between bar b is 1.5 mm.
The angle of inclination is 44 degrees from the horizontal
surface.
Loses in head is also created due to geometric changes of
penstock such as bends, racks, elbows, joints, sudden
contraction or enlargements of the penstock sections. In
sudden contraction, head is loss due to the rise in velocity of
water flow and the high turbulence is produced by the
variation of structure of penstock and these losses can be
taken into consideration for large hydro power plants. After
calculating the head loss in penstock, power output can be
calculated for run of the river hydro power plant.
III. Case Study
This paper describes the hourly operation plan of a run of
the river hydro power plant situated at Dor River in Pakistan
(34°03'28.8"N 73°08'14.5"E). The forecasted load of
COMSATS University and village near it, forecasted
discharge of water and electricity tariff is provided. The run of
the river hydro plant has no reservoir to store water so this
kind of plant has the storage problem. This paper presents a
model that has a compressed air storage facility that store
energy in the form of compressed air and generates electricity
when needed which helps in meeting demand during peak
hours. It provides the daily optimized operation schedule that
maximizes daily profit. The tariff from 1 am to 9 am is 120
$/MWh, from 10 am to 7 pm it is 90 $/MWh and from 8 pm
to 1 am it is 130 $/MWh. Using the daily forecasted discharge
of water per hour, the hourly generation can be calculated.
The hourly power generation for the whole day is shown in
Figure3.
Figure 3 Hourly hydro power generation
It can be seen from above figures that the generation is 2.6
MW in first hour whereas the load is just 0.8MW. The extra
1.8 MW is stored in the compressor by using motors. There
are four motors each of 0.4 MW to store air at a pressure of 20
bar.
IV. Results
The upper and lower limits of generator and storage capacity
are described in Table 1. Here L is the length of penstock, D is
diameter of penstock and V is the velocity of water flow.
Using these parameters, the obtained results are shown below.
TABLE I. System parameters
P 3 MW
P 2 MW
V 1.5 m/s
L 110 meter
sto 7 MW
D 0.5 meter
K 2.4
P 616.7 Pa
It can be seen from above figures that the maximum demand
occurs in day time from hour 11 to hour 21 but during that
time the discharge of water is low.
In Figure 4, shows the storage of compress air in the
form of MW and Pcompressor is the output power generation
by compressor storage in MW. The generation in the first hour
is greater than load by 1.8 MW and that extra power is given
to motor for storage or compress air..
Fig. 4 Compressor storage and its output power per hour in MW
The total power delivered to load is the summation of power
supplied from hydro, compressor and import power. In Figure
5, the daily optimized hourly operational schedule is shown.
The commitment of meeting demand will be fulfilled
Figure 5: Output power of all sources in MW
by using all the sources and the daily profit will increase from
1290 $/day to 1629 $/day by optimize scheduling.
Fig. 6 Hourly power delivered to load in MW
The power delivered to the load in Figure 6 is same as the
forecasted load in Figure 2. The purpose of coupling storage
technique is to utilize the maximum amount of resources
available in that specific area.
V. Conclusion
A daily optimal scheduling technique is proposed to analyze
the optimal operational strategy to be adopted in a hydro –
compressor plant. The application of compress air storage
facility allows a significant rise in the hydro power plant
profit on daily bases since the hydro energy is preferentially
delivered to the system. The extra hydro energy is used to
store compressed air during off-peak hours. The predicted
daily annual profit of power plant is in-between 1529 to 1686
$/day for the analyzed case. The compressed air storage
ability also increases the controllability over the output power
and it helps in meeting the demand during peak hours.
Objectives that are accomplished so far are: 1) to meet the
load during peak hours, 2) to optimize the daily operational
schedule to maximize the profit, 3) to analyze that the storage
technique enhances profit of power plant and is compatible
with existing hydro power plant.
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