Techno-economic analysis of PV/H2 systems

Abstract The purpose of this paper is to analyze the costs of grid-connected PV/H 2 systems sized to meet a setpoint power using ORIENTE ® software. The aim is to determine optimal component sizes to minimize cost of injection-to-grid. We study the case of guaranteed PV production where the PV array is coupled to a hydrogen chain to inject a constant setpoint power into the grid from 8am to 5pm (local time) all year long without failure (100% satisfaction level). We studied 4 setpoint powers: 100, 200, 300 and 400 kW. The results show that regardless of setpoint power, the optimum system design fits the ratios: installed PV power-to-setpoint power = 2.4–2.5; nominal electrolyzer power-to-setpoint power = 0.72–0.75; nominal fuel cell power-to-setpoint power = 1. We also found that the capacity of the H 2 tanks corresponds to around 48–50 days of off-grid power (number of days where setpoint power comes exclusively from the fuel cells).