#Forecasting Daily Power #Generation of #SolarPlant, published in Council of Power Utilities #INDIAPOWER, April - June 2017, Vol XXV No 2, Pg. 12

1. April - June 2017 Vol. XXV No.2
FeaturedArticles
Electricity Pricing: Re-Thinking
Policy for Paradigm Shift
Author: D. Radhakrishna
(Director-Deeaar Group)
26
Page
J&K, Punjab Ink Historic Agreement
on Water Power Sharing16
Page
REC To Be Premier
Power Sector Financing &
Development Enterprise by 2020
30
Page
NTPC Installs India's
Largest Floating Solar PV Plant44
Page
Power Ministry Planning
on New Hydropower Policy48
Page
Nissan Leaf Electric Car Considered
for India; Pilot Run Planned later this Year59
Page

3. Contents
India Power | April - June 2017 01
59 Nissan Leaf Electric Car Considered for India; Pilot Run
Planned later this Year
Editor's
PICK06
Section
03 Editorial
From The
EDITORIAL BOARD01
Section
60 Is Lacking in Values Hurting Us ? by Dr. Gyan Dutt Gautama
In
LIGHTER VEIN07
Section
Front Inside Siemens
09 Naresh Kumar & Co.
11 Dynamic Cables Pvt. Ltd.
15 Secure Meters Ltd.
19 CESC Ltd.
21 Tata Power Delhi Distribution Ltd.
33 Uttar Gujarat Vij Company Ltd.
35 Therapeutics Chemical Research Corporation
41 AKA Logistics Pvt. Ltd.
47 Convergence India 2018
49 Desein Pvt. Ltd.
51 PTC India Ltd.
56 8th World Renewable Energy Technology Congress
Back Inside CPU Recommended Events
Back Outside Tata Power
ADVERTISERS
Featured
ARTICLES03
Section
12 Forecasting Daily Power Generation of Solar Plants
Author: Abhik Kumar Das
(Founding Member-Del2Infinity Energy Consulting)
26 Electricity Pricing: Re-Thinking Policy for Paradigm
Shift
Author: D. Radhakrishna
(Director-Deeaar Group)
36 The Use of Innovative Groundwater Seepage Detection
Techniques
Author: Dr. Andy Hughes
(Director of Dams & Water Resources, Atkins Fellow,
Visiting Professor in Dam Engineering - Bristol
University, Chairman- British Dam Society
Infrastructure)
02 Looking Forward to 10th India Power Awards
05 Post-Event Coverage: Seminar on Future of Dam
Leakage Detection Systems
28 CPU Welcomes New Subscribers
29 India Power Journal Subscription Form
Back
Inside CPU Recommended Events
02
Section
Activities of the
COUNCIL
44 NTPC Installs India's Largest Floating Solar PV Plant
45 BHEL Looks to Provide From Power Sector to Transportation,
Electric Vehicles
52 Funding of New Investment, Bad Loans are Big Concerns:
Naresh Takkar-ICRA
53 Canadian Solar Signs PPAs for 80MW in India
54 In Virgina: Push for Pumped Storage Hydro, Questions Arise
about Viability
57 Are Opportunities Increasing in the Renewable Energy Sector
32 Cabinet Approves The Investment Proposal for Generation
Component of Arun-III Hydro Electric Project in Nepal by
SJVN Ltd.
42 Tata Power Touches Over 5 Lakh Lives through various CSR
Initiatives for Holistic Development of Communities
50 Sikkim Becomes 22nd State to join UDAY
PRESS RELEASES
Govt.
DIARIES04
Section
04 Innovate to Bring Down Cost of Power:
Shri Piyush Goyal
10 Plans For '24x7 Power For All' In True Spirit of
Cooperative Federalism-Piyush Goyal
16 J&K, Punjab Ink Historic Agreement on
Water Power Sharing
20 Govt. to Extend Sops For Mega Power Policy Projects by
5 Years
30 REC To Be Premier Power Sector Financing &
Development Enterprise by 2020
40 India Expresses Willingness to Support Bangladesh in
Renewable Energy Sector
48 Power Ministry Planning on New Hydropower Policy
NEWS
22 Africa's Green Energy Challenge: Mega Projects, Off-Grid or
Somewhere in Between ?
34 Amendments to Mega Power Policy '09 Gives Breather to Banks
News &
PRESS RELEASES05
Section
Editor
C.V.JVarma
Associate Editor
Tanushree Sharma
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4. Article
FORECASTING DAILY POWER
GENERATION OF SOLAR PLANT
Abhik Kumar Das
Del2infinity Energy Consulting
Abhik holds a Dual Degree (B. Tech in Electronics & Electrical
Communication Engineering & M. Tech in Automation and
Computer Vision) from Indian Institute of Technology,
Kharagpur, India. He has a vast experience in computational
modelling of complex systems. He has contributed in different
verticals of analytical modelling related to renewable energy,
energy analytics, techno-economics and published several well-
citedresearcharticlesininternationallyrecognizedjournalsand
peer-reviewed conferences. He is founding member of
del2infinity,anaccurateWindEnergy&SolarEnergyForecasting
andSchedulingSolutionsCompany.
(E-mail:contact@del2infinity.xyz).
DuetothepresentsocioeconomicdevelopmentinIndia,thedemandofenergyhas
multiplied manifold and this demand can be no longer satisfied by the traditional
energy sources. Hence the renewable energy is being considered as a
transformative solution to satisfy energy demand as well as economic
challenges.For a sustainable energy future, not only the energy demand, butthe
amount of emission of pollutants from traditional energy generation is an
important factor; and considering National Action Plan on Climate Change [1],
Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) [2], renewable energy (RE) goals [3],
India's national policies and other initiatives encourage renewable and clean
energyforvariousapplications.
At present, India has a target of 175 Giga Watt (GW) of installed capacity from
renewable energy by 2022, of which 100GW is to come from solar, 60GW from wind
[3].Taking India as an emerging place to set up solar businesses with international
and domestic investors, the 100 GW target in Solar can not be seen as unrealistic or
over-ambitious and the solar power generation shows a promising future in
India.Simply due to the variability and intermittency, large scale renewable energy
penetration in existing grid is a challenge and the proper policy and regulatory
mechanisms, technical solutions and institutional structures are central topics in
solarenergypenetration.
India Power | April - June 201712

5. Article
energy generators and the commercial settlement wasVARIABILITY IN SOLAR POWER GENERATION
introduced in Indian context by CERC through IndianThe variability and unpredictability inherent to solar power
Electricity Grid Code (IEGC), 2010 [8] and the Renewablegeneration raise a number of issues associated with grid
Regulatory Fund mechanism [9] was envisaged to beintegration. Sometimes we over-simplify the variability and
implemented from January 1, 2011. Due to variousuncertainty and believe these two quantities as of similar
implementation issues, the mechanism was never madenature. But the variability of solar power represents the
operational.Todevelopanimplementableframework,CERCchange of generation output due to fluctuations of solar
on 31.03.2015 issued a draft Amendments.To develop aninsolation and other weather parameters and uncertainty in
implementable framework, CERC also issued 2ndpower generation describes the inability to predict in
amendment to regulation for Deviation settlementadvancethechangesingenerationoutput.
mechanism and other related matters [10]. After CERC
Solar power generation is variable in nature and can be regulation, Forum of Regulators (FOR) [11] and other state
measured in a simple manner using inequality of power regulators issued or drafted regulation related to the
generation and Lorenz curve [4] and the irregularities in the forecasting and scheduling of Wind and Solar power
generation patterns can be interpreted using the Gini generation.
coefficient of power fluctuation.The power fluctuation can
Hence CERC, FOR and other state regulations propose thecreate the ramping events [5] in generation patterns and
mandatory requirement of forecasting the solar powercan affect the dependability of the power system.Due to
generation.Iftheerrorinschedulingthepowerismorethanramping issues, large scale solar integration into the grid
a certain limit, then there exists a penalty due to deviation,involves power system modelling and analytic thinking
but for solar power forecasting 8 Intraday revisions (oneusing short term and long term forecast of variable power
revision in every 1 hour 30 minutes) are allowed. Thisgeneration to ensure that the facility does not create
revision is in force from 4th time-block (1 time block = 15reliabilityissuesintheelectricitygrid[6].
minutes) onwards.Here the revisions are not compulsory,
Thoughsomestakeholdersconsidersthattheapplicationof butrevisionisusefultotunetheforecastaccuracy.
energy storage in solar power generation can remove the
need of forecasting in solar power generation, but the FORECAST METHODOLOGYOF SOLAR
energy storage can simply reduce the variability of solar POWER GENERATION
power generation; but cannot reduce the uncertainty in ThemostfunctionalandconventionalstrategiesinF&Ssolar
forcegeneration. power generation are predicting the weather parameters
using of NWP (Numerical Weather Prediction) models andThe variability and unpredictability inherent to solar energy
changing the values of weather parameters into powergenerationcreateathreattogridreliabilityduetobalancing
generation using the PV modules.The algorithms of ANNchallenge in load and generation.The unscheduled
(Artificial Neural Network) based methodologies havefluctuations of solar generation produce ramping events
produced a vast scope in forecasting the powerand thus the integration of significant solar energy into the
generations.ANN is not a simple statistical model, theexisting supply system is a challenge for large scale
formalization of dynamic behavior can be measuredrenewable energy penetration.To accommodate the
through ANN based architecture which produce anvariability, the day-ahead and short-term renewable energy
additional scope.Since F&S can be seen as a statistical ratherforecasting is needed to effectively integrate renewable
than finding deterministic solutions from computationalenergy to the existing grid and hence the prediction and
viewpoint, forecasting is best seen as the study of thescheduling of wind and solar energy generation has
temporal development of probability distributionsbecome a widely pursued area of research in Indian context
a s s o c i a t e d w i t h v a r i a b l e s i n t h e p o w e r[6,7].
generation.Forecasting with proper uncertainty analysis is
involved since the initial value vector and the neuralF&SREGULATION
architecture of DNN can never be precisely defined andTheForecastingandScheduling(F&S)ofvariablerenewable
there are observational limitations in different variablesenergy (Solar and Wind) generation are an essential
required to anticipate the power generation. Withoutnecessity of the stable grid system due to the balancing
properforecastingmodelsconsideringnon-lineardynamicschallenge in load and generation.Since the system
approaches, a small but appreciable fraction of error canoperators in India have to do curtailment of variable
createalargeerrorduetotemporalevolution.renewableenergyduetointermittencyandvariabilityofthe
wind and solar power generation, the forecasting takes an Though the NWP (Numerical Weather Prediction) model
important part in producing a sustainable solution for shows an average prediction of solar power generation, the
maximumuseofrenewableenergy. recent technological advancement of DNN (Deep Neural
Network)hascreatedavastscopeinforecastingsolarpowerThe concept of forecasting and scheduling of renewable
India Power | April - June 2017 13

6. generation with high accuracy. The dynamic modelling and probabilistic evolution of physical variables important for solar
powergenerationcreatesscenariobasedforecastingstrategyunlikeofpredictingthedeterministicforecastwithfixedpath.
A good forecasting system is a process which gives proper accuracy with minimum penalty due to deviation even in a small
capacity of solar plants with high variability with minimum number of Intraday revisions. Unnecessary submission of an
Intradayrevisionineveryoneortwohoursnotonlystandsfortheinefficiencyofforecastingalgorithm,butalsosymbolizesthe
lack of availability of proper pattern recognition algorithm in forecast models and it moves the grid management increasing
theindirectcostofgridstability.
Though numerous models are available using different methodologies, a good forecast must capture the genuine patterns
whichexistinthehistoricaldata,butdonotreplicatepasteventsthatwillnotoccuragain.Thoughthereisapaucityofhistorical
dataandthedatarelatedtoweatherparametersofdifferentsolarplantsinIndia,butthedel2infinity'sAIbasedsolutioncanbe
usedforforecastingandschedulingsolutionwhichcanminimizethepenaltyduetopresentregulationwithminimumnumber
of revisions and can work even when there is unscheduled variability. As an example, the figure shows the forecast of a 40 MW
plantwithSinglerevision,theAIbasedalgorithmisusefultoforecastthepatternoffluctuationswithacceptableaccuracy,
Article
Fig 1.Forecast of Solar Power generation in a Cloudy day with Single revision
The challenge lies in forecasting the solar
power generation in a variable environment
with minimum number of Intraday revision
such that the forecast solution has good
accuracy with a minimum value of the penalty
duetothedeviation. Theproposedregulation
tells about the aggregated forecast and
maximum 8 times Intraday revision, but the
forecast community should not confine
themselves in this regulation, but researchers
must try to forecast even in smaller capacity
plants with high vriability and with less
number of Intraday revision for better
efficiencyoftheforecastprocess.
• Das Abhik Kumar, 'Forecasting and Scheduling of Wind andReferences
Solar Power generation in India', NTPC's Third International• National Action Plan on Climate Change, GOI
technologySummit'GlobalEnergyTechnologySummit'2016(http://www.moef.nic.in/downloads/home/Pg01-52.pdf last
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February2010/IEGC_Review_Proposal.pdf last visited on 20CONTRIBUTION: WORKING TOWARDS CLIMATE JUSTICE
March2017)(http://www4.unfccc.int/submissions/INDC/Published%20D
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India Power | April - June 201714