+100% Renewable Power Matrix for Resilient Energy Supply in Galápagos Islands
(RePower Galápagos)

Team:
– Prof. Victor Herrera, PhD. (Team leader USFQ)
– Anahí Barreto (USFQ)
– Prof. Sasa Djokic, PhD. (Team leader UoE)
– As’Ad Zakaria (UoE)

Abstract:
Owing to their remarkable biodiversity and endemic ecosystems, the Galapagos Islands are one of the most important World Heritage sites. However, due to their isolation and remote geographical location, around 83.6% of the energy supply in Galapagos relies on the use of fossil fuels, which are polluting the air, the land and the sea, therefore requiring an adequate energy planning for the efficient transition towards a more sustainable and environmentally friendly energy sources.

This project proposes two different studies for the optimal decarbonization and transition to a 100% renewable energy supply of the Galapagos Islands, based on the development of modelling tools required for the analysis of different scenarios and considering different techno-economic constraints. The first study is used for a long-term for analysing and strategic planning of the energy matrix until 2050, starting from existing power plants and following projections for the deployment of new renewable-based energy generation and dedicated energy storage sources to determine the optimal sizing and timing of required grid upgrades. The second study is a short-term annual performance analysis, which considers days of minimum, average and maximum available renewable energy resources to optimize
system operation with existing and additional renewable energy generation and storage sources that will minimize, or keep at a certain target level, contributions from diesel generation. The two presented studies complement each other, allowing to evaluate transition to a 100% renewable energy supply in Galapagos from both the investment/planning perspective and from the operational point of view.

We envision an efficient, reliable and secure energy supply system not only for the whole Galapagos (e.g., with integrated electric transport systems in Santa Cruz-Baltra, San Cristobal and Isabella islands), but also for the electrical vessels and ships coming from the outside, allowing for their battery charging and swapping (therefore notion of “+100%”).

Publications:

Long-Term and Short-Term Analysis of the Transition Toward a Full Renewable Energy Supply in Galapagos Islands by 2050, Proceedings of the 4th Interdisciplinary Conference on Electrics and Computer (INTCEC), Chicago, USA, 2024. https://ieeexplore.ieee.org/document/10602832

Barreto-Cuesta, A., Herrera-Perez, V., Zakaria, A., Djokic, S., Transition to a 100 % Renewable Power Supply in Galapagos Islands: Long-term and Short-term Analysis for Optimal Operation and Sizing of Grid Upgrades, Renewable Energy, 2024. https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0960148124012758