International Journal of Engineering and Technology Innovation, vol . 7, no. 2, 2017, pp. 117 - 129 Copyright © TAETI Simulated Energy Production and Performance Ratio of 5 MW Grid-Connected Photovoltaic under Tropical Savannah Climate in Kupang Timor Island of Indonesia I. N. S. Kumara 1,* , M. Ashari 2 , A. S. Sampeallo 3 , A. A. G. A Pawitra 4 1,4 Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Udayana University, Bali, Indonesia. 2 Department of Electrical Engineering, Faculty of Industrial Technology, Institute Sepuluh Nopember, East Java, Indonesia. 3 Department of Electrical Engineering, Faculty of Science and Engineering, Nusa Cendana University, Timor, Indonesia. Received 20 July 2016; received in revised form 09 December 2016; accepted 11 December 2016 Abstract The objective of this paper is to obtain energy output and performance ratio of 5 MW grid-connected PV plant. The plant is located near the city of Kupang in the southeast of Indonesia. The location belongs to dry tropical climate with 28 o C average daily temperature and 67% and 87% average sunshine index during the rainy and hot season respectively. Daily solar irradiation varies from 5.52 to 6.38 kWh/m 2 . The plant uses 21,840 poly-crystalline 230 W modules configured as 1,040 array strings, and each array consists of 21 series-connected modules. The array is ground-mounted, fixed-tilted at 15 o and facing north. Maximum output is 5,023.2 kW. Conversion to AC is done by 250-unit inverter of 20 kW. Grid connection is via 10-unit of 630 KVA transformers. PVSyst simulation is fed with synthetic meteorological data which yielded annual energy of 7,476 MWh that varies monthly from 526 to 770 MWh, with an average of 623 MWh. Average annual yields are 4.08 kWh/kWp/day. Variation of tilt angles from 10 o to 20 o has small effects on energy output. Monthly performance ratio varies from 80% to 86% and average at 82%. Low-performance ratio is shown during May to August period which is likely caused by the high ambient temperature that affects the output of the solar module. PV loss due to temperature is the highest losses component at 11.2%. Keywor ds: grid-connected photovoltaic, tropical climate, energy production, performance ratio, IEC 61724 1. Introduction Timor Island is one among 6,000 inhabited islands that part of 13,466 islands belong to Indonesian archipelago as listed in the United Nations on Standardization of Geographical Names. It has a total land area of 30,777 square kilometers but around half of it in the eastern part is the territory of the Republic of Timor-Leste. The west of the island is part of East Nusa Tenggara, one of Indonesia’s provincial administrative area. In 2014, the total population of West Timor was 1,620,017 and 437,529 households. By the end of 2015, electrification ratio was 59%. Meanwhile, total electrical power generation capacity of the island is currently around 70 MW, which consists of 80% diesel power plant, 13% steam power plant, and 7% renewable generation [1]. The government of Indonesia plans to complete electrification of the whole country, including West Timor, by 2020 as stated in the National Energy Policy (NEP) released in 2014. According to the NEP, PV plant is set to contribute around 870 MW power by 2025. Currently, most of Indonesia’s PV plants is government-led projects and little contribution from the other * Corresponding author. E-mail address: satya.kumara@unud.ac.id Tel.: +62-361-703315; Fax: +62-361-703315