Techno-economic analysis of use of solar photovoltaic in telecom towers
Student name: Mr Himanshu Nagpal
Guide: Dr Ramkishore Singh
Year of completion: 2011
Host Organisation: ITP Senergy Advisory Services Pvt. Ltd. (formerly known as IT Power India Pvt. Ltd.)
Supervisor (Host Organisation): Mr Anil Kumar Nagpal
Abstract: This report gives a techno-economic viability of using a solar photovoltaic (SPV) system for
GSM based outdoor telecom towers in Jaisalmer, India. Two possible cases have been designed
and analysed for implement SPV in telecom towers; first is standalone SPV and another is a
hybrid of Photovoltaic (PV) and Diesel Generator (DG) set. Both systems have been
comparatively studied with the most likely conventional alternative system, i.e. a diesel-powered
system. While designing a standalone PV system two methods have been adopted one is
approximate design and another is precise design. Techno-economical viabilities have been
indicated by parameters like amount of energy generation, sizing of PV system and battery bank,
Net capital cost, Net Present Cost and Levelised Cost of Energy for all three system. Out of the
three systems, standalone SPV system comes out to be most expensive while the hybrid of PV-DG
come out to be the most technically feasible and economical viable, for location like Jaisalmer.
Financial parameters like LCOE and NPC are coming out lower than rest of the system. In PVDG
hybrid system there has been a reduction of more than 90% in DG set run time and carbon
dioxide emissions every year.
Further a sensitivity analysis has been done on the conventional DG set based system and PV
DG hybrid system against some OPEX variables such as diesel price and DG set run time in day,
to understand the effect on component sizing such as battery bank size, DG set size, effect on
financial parameters like LCOE and NPC. With rise in diesel prices, NPC and LCOE of a
conventional DG based system increases as compared to that of PV DG hybrid. While reducing
the DG set run time (hr/day), NPC and LCOE of the DG set based system gives better financial
performance but at the same time it increases the battery bank and DG set size.
Keywords: BTS mobile tower, PV-DG hybrid system, Net Present Cost (NPC), Levelized Cost of
Energy (LCOE), carbon emission.
