New-energy topics: what to specify, how it is checked, what usually goes wrong
One card per domain — PV, wind, storage, micro-hydro and wind–solar–storage hybrids. Each card names the audience, the parameters that decide the selection, the calculation basis, the common pitfalls, and the page of the simulator that carries the numbers. Values the engine does not return yet are labelled "to be wired" and are never estimated here.
- Audience:
- buyers / owners
- design institutes / electrical engineers
Micro-hydro
to be wiredAudience
Owners of run-of-river schemes; design engineers checking the islanded case.
Selection parameters
Net head and design flow; turbine and generator efficiency; governor and flywheel effect; synchronous or induction machine; the frequency regulation the scheme can actually provide.
Basis and assumptions
Micro-hydro is usually run-of-river with little storage, so output follows the water available; an islanded scheme needs a master source that holds V and f, not a PQ source.
Common pitfalls
Quoting installed capacity as firm output; applying inverter (PQ) protection settings to an islanded synchronous machine; leaving the scheme without a defined V–f master.
Where the numbers come from
The hydro block is available as a base-load source in the topology builder (/builder); the islanded frequency estimate and the hosting capacity run on /island; load flow and voltage on /powerflow.
To be wired
No dedicated micro-hydro study or page exists yet — the domain is carried by the builder block and the islanding pages, and is marked "to be wired" on the page.
Wind–solar–storage hybrids
to be wiredAudience
Buyers and owners sizing a hybrid plant; design engineers checking curtailment and reverse flow.
Selection parameters
Capacity ratio between the three sources; storage power and duration (C-rate and hours); the curtailment and deficit thresholds; short-circuit capacity at the point of connection.
Basis and assumptions
Complementarity has to be judged on an hourly series, not on monthly averages; the engine returns 24 or 96 points per day depending on the study, and curtailment and deficit energy come from the engine.
Common pitfalls
Judging complementarity from monthly averages; assuming storage absorbs all curtailed energy; designing without checking the reverse flow that pushes the busbar voltage up.
Where the numbers come from
Hosting capacity on /island; the hourly series on /timeseries; wind with hydrogen on /wind-hydrogen; storage on /bess; the PV side on /pv.
To be wired
Joint three-source capacity optimisation has no engine study yet — sizing the optimum split stays "to be wired".
- pv-interconnection-calculator
Every figure the simulator shows is returned by the calculation engine on that page; this guide is not a substitute for it. Items marked "to be wired" have no engine source yet and are shown as such instead of being estimated.
