Performance comparison of diesel and solar photovoltaic power systems for water pumping in Saudi Arabia

Optimum configuration of solar photovoltaic (PV) power generation system has been carried out for achieving a minimum cost of energy (COE) in five different geographic locations in Saudi Arabia, namely, Dhahran, Riyadh, Jeddah, Guriat and Nejran. The ultimate goal in the present study is to investigate and compare the performance of both the diesel and solar PV stand-alone power generating systems for underground water pumping purposes. It is found that the solar PV power generating system not only helps to decrease carbon emission to the atmosphere but also is comparable in the unit COE with the diesel only system in many sites even though the unit price of the diesel fuel is very low.The proposed diesel only system produces annually about 24,069 tons of green house gases which can be otherwise eliminated by using solar PV system. Cost of water pumping from an underground well of 50 m total dynamic head is found to vary from 10-17 US¢/m³ for the five sites considered. When compared with the diesel only system this range of cost is found to be comparable when the diesel fuel price is 0.6$/L or more.