Technical and economic evaluation of nuclear powered hybrid renewable energy system for fast charging station

Abstract

Fast Charging Station (FCS) is required to reduce charging time of electric vehicle, electric bus, or electric trucks. However, FCS requires high amount of power to support charging a large number of vehicles in reduced time. To reduce the load on the grid and lower the emission of greenhouse gas (GHG), renewable energy sources (RESs) are the most promising option. Renewable energy sources are intermittent, and the penetration of renewable energy sources are restricted by the area and the capacity of the charging station. To address this issue, a micro modular reactor that acts as a small nuclear power plant is introduced to support the RESs and minimize GHG emissions. The proposed Nuclear-Renewable Hybrid Energy System (N-R HES) is compared with different energy systems such as standalone diesel generator-based systems, conventional diesel generators integrated with RESs, standalone small nuclear power plants, in terms of greenhouse gas emission, cost of energy, net present cost, and return on investment to analyze the feasibility of the N-R HES. Sensitivity analysis is performed to assess the technical and economic aspects of the proposed system, where results show that the N-R HES can be a reliable option for sustainable energy solutions and decarbonization.

Keywords

• Nuclear-renewable hybrid energy system
• Fast-charging
• Electric vehicles
• Charging station
• Hybrid energy system