Battery storage sizing for wind power plant hybridization considering economic and environmental aspects

This work proposes a novel approach for the optimal sizing of energy storage of a hybrid wind power plant (WPP). The formulation aims to find optimal trade-offs between economic and environmental net values due to adding storage. The formulation uses historical WPP production data to improve the quality of the results and includes the determination of an optimal storage dispatch schedule already during the plant sizing process. The proposed approach is demonstrated on the optimization of a Li-ion battery system used for hybridizing an existing WPP. When compared to existing standard sizing approaches, it was found that improved results are obtained when an optimal battery schedule is considered already during the sizing stage. Additionally, results indicate an increase in the economic net value with increasing battery size, thanks to the access to multiple revenue streams beyond the simple sale of the electricity generated by the WPP. Further economic and environmental benefits are obtained by a proper balancing against battery degradation enabled by the use of the parametric online rainflow counting approach. Interestingly, results also indicate a decrease in the environmental net value with increasing battery size. This result, which is made possible by the multi-objective approach used here, highlights the importance of striking a correct balance between economic and environmental aspects when hybridizing a WPP.