Performance and Economics of a Wind-Diesel Hybrid Energy System

This report provides an overview of the wind resource, economics and operation of the recently installed wind turbines in conjunction with diesel power for the Naval Air Landing Field (NALF), San Clemente Island (SCI), California Project. The primary goal of the SCI wind power system is to operate with the existing diesel power plant and provide equivalent or better power quality and system reliability than the existing diesel system. The wind system is also intended to reduce, as far as possible, the use of diesel fuel and the inherent generation of nitrogen-oxide emissions and other pollutants. The first two NM 225/30 225kW wind turbines were installed and started shake-down operations on February 5, 1998. This report describes the initial operational data gathered from February 1998 through January 199, as well as the SCI wind resource and initial cost of energy provided by the wind turbines on SCI. In support of this objective, several years of data on the wind resources of San Clemente Island were collected and compared to historical data. The wind resource data were used as input to economic and feasibility studies for a wind-diesel hybrid installation for SCI.