Feasibility of Low Carbon Renewable Energy City Integrated with Hybrid Renewable Energy Systems

This study evaluated the energy saving potential of renewable energy generation systems based on integrated solar energy in an urban environment. The solar city concept was implemented using photovoltaic (PV) and solar thermal systems. As a case study, the Sejong national pilot smart city in South Korea was selected to evaluate the renewable energy penetration rate. For evaluating the proposed renewable energy systems, the electrical and thermal loads of the smart city were estimated using field measurement data. Then, the renewable energy penetration rate of the city was evaluated. The HomerPro software was used to analyze the PV generation and operating energy consumption of the natural gas (NG) generator with a district heating network. The thermal load-supporting potential of the solar thermal system was estimated using the TRNSYS software. The results showed that the proposed urban integrated renewable energy system could meet over 30% of the renewable energy penetration rate and the levelized cost of energy and total net present cost was 7% lower than the base case system (i.e., NG generator). The proposed system also exhibited 38% less CO2 emissions than the base case system.