Development of Optimal Site Selection Method for Large Scale Solar Photovoltaic Power Plant

In this paper, method selecting optimal location for large scale photovoltaic (PV) power plant in Imo State is carried out. Ten local government areas (LGAs) in Imo were selected out of the 27 LGAs in the state. Also, five parameters were used for ranking the selected LGAs for their suitability for large scale PV power plant. The five parameters are; (i) Global Irradiation On Horizontal Plane (kWh/m²) (ii) Available Energy (Kwh) (iii) Yearly Unit Cost of Energy (iv) Population (v) Land Mass (Km2). PVSyst software was used for the simulation of the PV energy generator output and unit cost at each of the selected LGA. The meteorological data used for the simulation was obtained from NASA website. Also, population density and land mass of each of the LGAs were obtained from Nigerian Population Commission publication. In all, Umuapu has the highest PV Site Suitability Factor (PVSSF) of 142 while Oguta has the least with 39. Consequently, the optimal site for large scaled PV power plant among the selected LGAs in Imo State is Umuapu. Accordingly, Umuapu has the PV Site Suitability Rank (PVSSR) of one (1) while Oguta has the poorest PVSSR value of 10.