ASABE Technical Library - Abstract

Abstract.

The aim of this study was to assess the impacts of solar photovoltaics (PV) and wind power on the electricity consumption and related costs of a seasonal calving dairy farm. This work uses mathematical models to simulate the annual electricity production of a PV system and a wind turbine, as well as the electricity consumption of a dairy farm. The combined modelling platform allowed the impacts of electricity generated by the renewable systems on the overall annual electricity consumption and related costs of a given farm to be quantified. Two renewable systems, three feed-in tariffs (FITS), four technology scenarios and three electricity tariffs were considered. In terms of annual electricity costs, for both PV and wind, the scenario of an Ice Bank milk cooling system with night time electric water heating, using a Day/Night electricity tariff was found to be the optimum, under all three of the FITs investigated. The annual electricity costs for this scenario varied from €2,359 to €3,113 when using a PV system and from €2,452 to €3,191 when using a wind turbine. The analysis also revealed that, under certain conditions, the annual monetary savings achieved by a grid connected PV system were similar to those achieved using a standalone system. Furthermore, it was found that annual monetary savings associated with wind turbines were sensitive to FITs, while savings associated with PV varied in sensitivity depending on the technology scenario employed.