Impact of the Economic Environment Modelling for the Optimal Design of a Multi-Energy Microgrid

The paper discusses the impact of the problem formulation for the optimal design of a multi-energy microgrid. The study shows that the energy rates affect the output results much more than any other parameter such as the cost of equipment or the assets efficiencies (ratio 1 to 100). The main focus of the paper is then the representation of the economic environment for such a planning problems. Five different modeling approaches are investigated with both deterministic and stochastic methods (scenario-based formulation), as well as constant or increasing rates along the planning horizon. The obtained results show great impacts on the installed capacities (variations from simple to triple for the gas engine rated power), while the objective function (i.e. system cost of ownership) displays small variations less than 5 % with the different sets of hypothesis. The papers then concludes on a recommendation to present the results in terms of optimal areas instead of a single global optimum for such problems.