Micro CHP is a micro combined heat and power system that consumes natural gas or other types of fuel and produces heat and power. The growing worldwide demand for less polluting types of energy has led to a renewed interest in the use of Micro Combined Heat and Power technologies in the residential sector.During the process of increasingacceptance of Micro CHP systems,manufacturers and customers are interested to know what the optimum capacity of power generators for these devices is and if these systems are installed in the building, what strategies should be used to minimize the costs of supplying electricity and heat for households. In this paper, a mixed integer nonlinear programming model has been developed. The objective is to minimize annual cost of the energy system for a given residential customer equipped with the CHP plant, combining with a storage tank and a back-up boiler. The model reports the optimal CHP system capacities that customers could employ given their electricity and thermal requirements and minimize a customer’s cost to meet its electricity and heat requirements. Then, a sensitivity analysis is elaborated which indicates that optimal value of CHP capacity is sensitive to capital cost, energy prices, as well as the electricity buyback. An optimal storage tank can extent the operating time of the CHP plant, in addition a Time Of Use (TOU) tariff structure will almost always result in a larger cost saving ratio.
TeymouriHamzehkolaei F, Sattari S. The Optimal Model for Capacity-Building and Operation of Micro CHP Systems in the Residential Buildings. IJE 2011; 14 (2) :42-58 URL: http://necjournals.ir/article-1-213-en.html