Calculation of bright roof-tops for solar PV applications in Dhaka Megacity, Bangladesh

Bangladesh has already been known as the country of power crisis. Although the country's electricity generation capacity is 4275 MW, around 3000-3500 MW of electricity can be generated against the demand of more than 5000 MW. The country's power is being generated mostly with conventional fuel (82% indigenous natural gas, 9% imported oil, 5% coal) and renewable sources (4% hydropower and solar). But recently a remarkable decline of the indigenous gas takes place, which rapidly aggravates electricity generation. Dhaka, the capital as well as prime city of the country with its nearly 14 million populations faces the worst situation due to the shortfall of electricity. Around 1000-1200 MW of electricity is supplied to Dhaka Megacity, while the existing demand is nearly 2000 MW. As a result frequent load shedding takes place and most of the service sectors in the city are interrupted, which has recently created immense dissatisfaction among the city-dwellers. Given the city's power crisis and geophysical situations, applications of either stand-alone or grid connected PV systems would be very effective and pragmatic for power supplement. The conservative calculation of bright roof-tops from the Quickbird Scene 2006 of Dhaka city indicates that the city offers 10.554 km(2) of bright roof-tops within the Dhaka City Corporation (DCC) ward area (134.282 km(2)). The application of stand-alone PV systems with 75 Wp solar modules can generate nearly 1000 MW of electrical power, which can substantially meet the city's power demand. (C) 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.