Analysis and design of solar PV system using Pvsyst software

Abstract Nowadays, Afghanistan is facing a challenging energy situation; the electricity consumption to the national Grid is imported from neighboring countries, such as Iran, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan and Turkmenistan. This country is annually paying 280 million dollars to the neighboring countries for importing 670 MW. Nevertheless, the country is still facing a shortage of electricity in the rural area. To overcome these issues, the government of Afghanistan is planning to generate 5,000 MW of renewable energy by 2032; among them the share of solar projects should be 1,500 MW. According to the Afghanistan Renewable Energy Union (AREU), solar projects would cover 30% of electricity demand in 2032. The Daykundi province is located in the center of Afghanistan, which is having great sunlight to generate solar energy. The designing of 700KWp has been tested on Pvsyst software in which the system production is 1266MWh/yr. The performance ratio is 0.797. Therefore when the power factor is between (0.7–0.9) the system is working in good condition, solar energy technology is increasingly being recommended for electricity production. In this paper the simulation of a 700KWp Grid-connected solar power plant in Daikundi province of Afghanistan is presented with the use of Pvsyst software and all their performances have been evaluated.