Renewable energy is the only known source that can suffice the global demand in a sustainable way while preserving human and environmental health. Fossil fuels offer an unparalleled ability to robustly transform simple ideas into lucrative businesses and operations despite its inherent devastation imposed to the ecosystem and energy security. Together, fossil fuels, renewable energy and battery storage technology, offer great promise for an improved quality of life inclusive of global access to environmentally pristine, uninterrupted energy. Hybrid systems can be designed to deliver clean, portable energy cost-effectively, efficiently and reliably while minimizing present-day economic and environmental impact. An improvement in battery storage technology is of paramount importance to design an optimal hybrid system necessary to meet peak demands and compensate for intermittency within renewable energy resources. Various battery types have been developed as the technology of choice for renewable energy applications but compatibility issues of different battery systems to renewable energy sources remain. This study provides a comparative analysis of battery storage systems and introduces a mathematical model for a photovoltaic-wind-diesel hybrid system integrating optimization and performance techniques along with an economic analysis that will be used for further study and future simulation.
