Accelerating Mini-grid Feasibility Assessments with Rapid Engineering and Business Model Evaluation

Abstract

There are over 700 million people without access to electricity in the world today, most of which live in Sub-Saharan Africa. Due to the high cost of grid extension, off-grid mini-grids with renewable energy technologies have been considered to be a least cost option for providing electricity access for communities, with solar home systems common for isolated households. However, mini-grid feasibility assessments can be expensive, time consuming, and achieve limited accuracy with current planning tools and constraints. In this paper we develop new planning processes for off-grid mini-grid systems and demonstrate this approach for a mini-grid project for an off-grid community in Sierra Leone, with comparisons made to conventional planning steps. Results show a decrease in assessment time per site of over 75-80% when compared to conventional practices, and provide additional benefits including power engineering, costing of the distribution network, and more detailed cashflow and business model analysis.