A Techno-Economic Investigation of Wind Power Potential in Coastal Belt of Sindh: Preventing Energy Crisis in Pakistan

Abstract

Pakistan has been facing an energy crisis for many years. Techno-economic analysis of wind power generation is carried out to meet energy demand. Wind data from 2016 to 2018 has been selected for a coastal site of Sindh, Pakistan. For this purpose, four distribution functions, namely Weibull, Gamma, Rayleigh, and Lognormal are used. These distribution functions are compared using the coefficient of determination (R2) and root mean square error tests. Wind potential on a daily, monthly, yearly and seasonal basis is evaluated. In this regard, various turbine models are selected to estimate their power generation capacity. The assessment results for a hub height of 100 m shows the average wind speed for three years is 7.9 m/s with direction dominated between the West and Southwest. The most probable wind speed is 9.5 m/s having a maximum energy density of 455 kWh/m2 in May. The maximum mean wind speed of 8.55 m/s is in the spring. The Weibull distribution function (k = 2.92 & C = 8.86 m/s) performs the best. The maximum capacity factor for Fuhrlander LLC WTU 3.0–120 is 55.49% and for Siemens SWT-3.15–142 is 55.22%. Likewise, the estimated lowest LCOE ($/1kWh) for Fuhrlander LLC WTU 3.0–120 and Siemens SWT-3.15–142 is $0.04016 and $0.04035 respectively. Thus, this site contains suitable technical and economic characteristics of the wind power plant.