Analysis and Design of a Domestic Solar-Wind Hybrid Energy System for Low Wind Speeds

A solar-wind hybrid power generation system has been presented here. The application based system illustrated in this paper is designed on the basis of the solar and wind data for areas in Northern India. The power generated by the system is intended for domestic use. The most common source of unconventional power in homes is battery based UPS (Uninterrupted power supply) inverter. The UPS inverter charges the battery with conventional grid power. This system will charge the battery of UPS inverter by using only wind and solar power, which will make the system cost effective and more reliable. The reason for using both solar and wind is that recent studies have proven that combined system can be more productive and consistent and other thing is that neither of them can be used for continuous power generation. In the system illustrated in this paper the solar-wind system provides power periodically which is controlled by electronic methods and a microcontroller is used to monitor the power from both the inputs. The switching action is provided from the microcontroller to the battery charging based on the power received from solar photovoltaic panel and wind generators. In this paper, an efficient system has been presented comprising of solar panel, wind generator, charge controller and charge storage unit (battery). Solar panel is selected as the main input and the wind resource will be used only in the absence of the solar photovoltaic (PV) output.