Energy management and economics of a trigeneration system Considering the effect of solar PV, solar collector and fuel price

• We investigate a typical micro combined cooling, heating and power (CCHP) system.
• We investigate the CCHP system reliability, economics and emissions.
• The effects of solar collectors, PVs and fuel prices on CCHP costs are investigated.
• We study the system under different fuel price scenarios.
• The renewable energy systems still have high costs with low fuel costs in Iran.
• The renewable base CCHP systems would become more economically justified by increasing the fuel price.

The effect of solar PVs, solar collectors and fuel price on optimization of a typical micro combined cooling, heating and power (CCHP) system based on a natural-gas generator (NGG) was investigated. The CCHP system was considered to supply the given cooling, heating and electricity demand of a 5 story high residential building; having a total of 1000 m2 floor area with the peak electricity of 48 kW, heating and cooling needs of 100 and 50 kW, respectively. If Iran removes the fuel subsidy, the cost of fuel would increase and the PV or hybrid PV/Generator systems would become more attractive. In this paper, a techno-economical procedure was conducted by using two definitions of loss of power supply probability (LPSP) and levelized cost of energy (LCOE). The results indicated that the optimal operation strategy changes with boiler and NGG fuel prices while it also changes with increasing the number of solar collectors.