Techno-economic evaluation of hybrid renewable systems for green hydrogen production and utilization

This study presents a techno-economic feasibility assessment of integrating green hydrogen into microgrid systems. Three standalone renewable-hydrogen configurations were evaluated for residential energy supply in remote regions. The modelled systems were simulated and optimized using HOMER Pro software and evaluated based on Net Present Cost (NPC), Levelized Cost of Energy (LCOE), Cost of Hydrogen (COH), and CO₂ emissions. The sensitivity analysis was conducted on solar radiation, wind speed, and load demand to assess the robustness of the results under several input conditions. Results show that the PV-wind-hydrogen configuration achieves the lowest NPC of $19,728.12, LCOE of $0.2577/kWh, and a COH of $4.29/kg. The PV-H 2 system yielded the highest hydrogen output of 106 kg/y along with the highest cost of $0.3559/kWh, whereas the Wind-H₂ system achieved moderate performance of $0.2875/kWh LCOH and $4.79/kg COH. CO₂ emissions were reduced to 60.16 kg/y for the hybrid system compared to 319 kg/y for the PV-only configuration when compared to an equivalent diesel-based scenario. The findings confirm that hybrid renewable-hydrogen microgrids offer a cost-effective and environmentally viable solution for decentralized energy generation in arid and semi-arid off-grid regions.