Assessment of Hybrid Renewable Energy Systems to supplied energy to Autonomous Desalination Systems in two islands of the Canary Archipelago

Highlights: • The seawater desalination in Canary Islands. • The use of renewable energy in autonomous desalination systems. • Modeling of hybrid systems based on renewable energies. • Optimum hybrid renewable energy systems for autonomous desalination systems. -- Abstract: In the following work the hybrid systems with base in the renewable energy (RE) are modeled to compare many different design options based on their technical and economic merits. The power requirements will be guaranteed to reverse osmosis Autonomous Desalination Systems (ADS), with a capacity of up to 50 m³ of daily production. The HOMER Hybrid Optimization Model Tool has been used to create optimal designs for these renewable energy systems. The input assumptions in the model were: the electric demand of the desalination plant, the technical specifications of the equipments, as well as the potentials of solar radiation and the wind speeds. Although this study could be applied to different scenarios where an isolated system is found, in this work it has been applied to two islands. In particular these islands have got a relative high wind profile, along with a high a solar radiation profile. Several configurations have been considered by this simulation software and different optimal results attending to the use of renewable energy have been obtained for this particular case. In fact, real data from two particular islands (Lanzarote and Fuerteventura) have been used, although the results could be extent to other similar scenarios.