POWER SYSTEMS BASED ON RENEWABLE ENERGY SOURCES FOR THE RURAL ELECTRIFICATION IN RIO GRANDE DO SUL - BRAZIL

摘要

The Energy Ministry of the State of Rio Grande do Sul – RS (Brazil) leads the Renewable Energy SourcesProgram in cooperation with the Federal Energy Ministry. The main goal of the program is the energysupply to household, school, community centers and small villages in rural areas, all of them far off the grid.The energy supply is accomplished through stand-alone PV systems, PV/Wind systems and smallhydroelectric plants.This work presents the main results of those projects and other initiatives done in cooperation with localcompanies and universities. The project activities include system sizing, installation/maintenance and usertraining. Altogether 60 PV systems were implemented: Fifty two Schools (along with community centers)are electrified with stand-alone PV systems, seven PV Pump systems for water consumption, as well as alarge stand-alone PV system (1,6 kWp) for milk conservation of rural producers and a hybrid PV/Windsystem for a fisher village in the coastal area. Since the rural properties without electricity in RS areproductive (for example, fish and milk production), there is a need especially for refrigerators and freezersbesides lighting and communication. All systems are provided with inverters in order to enable the use ofusual electric appliances like as ac refrigerator/freezer. The different power systems are described and thedetected technical problems are related. Among other initiatives it is a project accomplished by the LutheranUniversity of Brazil in cooperation with the utility Rio Grande Energia, where 50 wind and pv systems wereinstalled for the power supply for rural residences. Finally, a discussion about the expectation of the furtherdevelopment of rural electrification is presented in light of a new federal resolution, which establish that thetotality of the rural properties in Brazil must be electrified until 2005. In the next three years around 76,000rural properties in RS should be electrified through grid extension. It would still remain about 37,000 ruralproprieties without electricity. In this context our experience with more than a hundred systems abovementioned will be valuable related to the orientation of future decisions.