PV solar system design and installation for agriculture application: a case study of a poultry farm in douar frikat Ain Oulmene Setif, Algeria

Abstract

This project presents different technical approaches for energy conservation in the egg production farms. The main approach was first to evaluate the quantitative energy requirements through held interviews, then using Simulink and DIALux, series of simulations and calculations were conducted in order to seek for the most efficient light bulb and how many of them to be installed. Furthermore, an application named the Light Cost Calculator using MATLAB app-designer were developed to estimate the amount of saved money in case of using the suggested light bulb over the actual installed ones. It was found that installing thirty-five 5 watts, 470 lumens classic LED bulbs is much more efficient and super economical compared to the actual 40 watts incandescent bulbs. Afterwards, the intension was to seek for more energy conservation options, so knowing that the cooling and ventilation system represents 25 percent from the overall energy usage, an application called the Fan Selector using app-designer were developed to seek for more efficient electric fans. The possibility of using BLDC fans were also investigated. The obtained feedback from the Fan Selector application pointed out that using four BLDC fans is at least twice efficient than using normal AC fans in a farm of 10000 hens with 1.5Kg each, in average. The application also revealed that a considerable amount of money will be saved when using these BLDC fans. The last phase was the integration of photovoltaic solar system in the egg production farm. The proposed system is a standalone 12 kW peak system. It is equipped with battery banks of 1500 Ah, eight strings of six modules connected in series in conjunction with two three phase string inverters. This thesis aims to combine all the previous strategies staring from replacing the traditional incandescent bulbs, seeking for the most electric fans and eventually investing in solar energy to minimize the electricity usage and therefore maximize the profits.