Optimal Coordination of Wind Power and Pumped Hydro Energy Storage

A study combining wind power with pumped hydro energy storage for the Jordanian utility grid is presented. Three solvers of the Matlab optimization toolbox are used to find the optimal solution for the cost of energy in a combined on-grid system. Genetic algorithm, simulated annealing (SA), and pattern search (PS) solvers are used to find the optimal solution. The GA solution of 0.0955388 $/kWh is economically feasible. This is 28.7% lower than the electricity purchased from the conventional utility grid. The discounted payback period to recover the total cost is 10.271 years. The suggested configuration is shown to be feasible by comparing it to real measurements for this case and a previous wind-only case. It is shown that the indicators of the optimal solution are improved. For instance, carbon dioxide emissions (E-CO2) and conventional grid energy purchases are reduced by 24.69% and 24.68%, respectively. Moreover, it is shown that the benefits of adding hydro storage, combined with increasing the number of wind turbine units, reduces the cost of energy of renewables (COERenewables). Therefore, combining hydro storage with wind power is economically, environmentally, and technically a more efficient alternative to the conventional power generation.