Isolated grid solar-battery support for SWER

Timings, Philip (2015) Isolated grid solar-battery support for SWER. [USQ Project]

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Abstract

The small town of Windorah in outback Western Queensland has its own, isolated distribution mini-grid. Both the power station and the local, isolated distribution network are owned and operated by Ergon Energy, Queensland’s primary rural electricity distributor. The power station at Windorah has 3 base-load diesel prime power generating sets, but it also has five, 26 kW Photo Voltaic (PV) concentrating dishes. The town also has distributed customer PV generation.

Only 16 km to the East of Windorah’s network, the end of a grid-connected, Single Wire Earth Return (SWER) feeder stretches 200 km from the town of Quilpie to the South-East. With increasing and sporadic loads, much of Queensland’s rural and regional SWER feeders are under consideration for upgrade. Augmentation systems such as reactive power injection, energy storage or routing of new supply backbones have been investigated and implemented as alternatives to re-stringing some of the suffering SWER network.

This thesis aims to technically analyse the load and generation data from the two independent systems (SWER and Mini-grid) to determine if an opportunity exists for connection of the two through a battery storage system. The intent was two-fold; 
- Place load on the SWER line to assist with voltage issues and to provide for
diesel offsetting in the town of Windorah and;
- Provide power injection to the SWER to compensate for reactive power and to
supply energy when required.
- Make use of the abundance of Solar Generation in Windorah

A literature review was conducted, examining the current research and options already available and employed for SWER replacement mitigation. The review also looked at the issues common to long line feeders, in particular regional Queensland’s SWER lines.

The analysis concluded that the SWER out of Quilpie presents a unique opportunity to use the extra solar generation spill in the town of Windorah to both extend the life of the current SWER installation, as well as significantly reduce the consumption of diesel fuel through offsetting the requirement for spinning reserve.


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Item Type: USQ Project
Item Status: Live Archive
Additional Information: Bachelor of Engineering (Electrical and Electronic) project
Faculty/School / Institute/Centre: Historic - Faculty of Health, Engineering and Sciences - School of Mechanical and Electrical Engineering (1 Jul 2013 - 31 Dec 2021)
Supervisors: Das, Narottam
Date Deposited: 06 Jun 2016 04:26
Last Modified: 06 Jun 2016 04:26
Uncontrolled Keywords: Single Wire Earth Return (SWER), Solar, Mini-grid
Fields of Research (2008): 09 Engineering > 0906 Electrical and Electronic Engineering > 090608 Renewable Power and Energy Systems Engineering (excl. Solar Cells)
Fields of Research (2020): 40 ENGINEERING > 4008 Electrical engineering > 400803 Electrical energy generation (incl. renewables, excl. photovoltaics)
URI: https://sear.unisq.edu.au/id/eprint/29239

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