Smart electrification : microgrid concept for remote areas in developing countries : Indian case study

After a long history of development, power systems are entering in so-called smart grid period. Smart grids aim to support not only the developed countries by integration of state-of-the-art ICT technologies, but also developing countries with more efficient and flexible energy supply options. This paper describes the Microgrid concept, as a part of smart grids, to assist with electrification in developing countries, from an Indian perspective. Current status of rural electrification under the Indian government policies has been analyzed and the challenges are investigated. A bottom-up approach is proposed by implementing Microgrids to overcome the challenges associated with the current deployments. To enable the autonomous operation of Microgrids, multi-agent system technology has been suggested for the energy supply-demand management. The data collected from a field trip is used to investigate the economic and technical feasibility of solar photovoltaic-battery-diesel generator based Microgrid. The simulation results show a significant contribution of the proposed approach for the rural electrification target