Spatial Analysis of Site Suitability for Solar Photovoltaic Plants in Kaduna Metropolis, Kaduna State, Nigeria

Nigeria is blessed with abundant natural source of renewable energy the; solar, wind, hydro and biomass. However, despite its strategic location near the equatorial region, the use of solar as a source of energy in the country is very insignificant. The current study focused on the spatial analysis of site suitability for solar photovoltaic (PV) power plant in the study area. Administrative map of the study area, Global Horizontal Irradiance (GHI), temperature, elevation, sentinel imagery, power line and road data were used for the study. Analysis was conducted using analytical hierarchical process (AHP) excel template and ArcGIS 10.8 software. Results on the suitability of economic factors revealed that, highly suitable area recorded the highest percentage for aspect (45.4%) and slope (99.1%), while unsuitable area for LULC (67.5%), road (53.1) and power line (59.01) recorded the highest percentage. Results for technical factors showed highly suitable with 66.4% and moderately suitable with 79.9% to be occupying more land area for GHI and temperature respectively. The result on the comparison matrix using AHP revealed GHI with 38.6% with high impact while road with only 4% with the lowest at 4% confidential level. Result on the site suitability index for the PV installation indicated moderately suitable area to has occupied the largest area with 73.7% while unsuitable with the lowest (0.9%) percent. Findings generally indicated that, there are five optimum sites for solar PV plant in the area with the capacity of PV output ranging from 1453.08 to 1459.37 kwh/m2/year. Based on these, it is concluded that, there are potential site for solar PV plant in Kaduna metropolis and these sites can provide the amount of energy required. Hence, the study recommends the provision of this type of plant in the area in order to reduce the much pressure on hydro power supply.