Renewable Energy Potential by the Application of a Building Integrated Photovoltaic and Wind Turbine System in Global Urban Areas

Globally, maintaining equilibrium between energy supply and demand is critical in urban areas facing increasing energy consumption and high-speed economic development. As an alternative, the large-scale application of renewable energy, such as solar and wind power, might be a long-term solution in an urban context. This study assessed the overall utilization potential of a building-integrated photovoltaic and wind turbine (BIPvWt) system, which can be applied to a building skin in global urban areas. The first step of this study was to reorganize the large volume of global annual climate data. The data were analyzed by computational fluid dynamic analysis and an energy simulation applicable to the BIPvWt system, which can generate a P max 300 Wp/module with a 15% conversion efficiency from a photovoltaic (PV) system and a 0.149 power coefficient/module from wind turbines in categorized urban contexts and office buildings in specific cities; it was constructed to evaluate and optimize the ratio that can cover the current energy consumption. A diagram of the distribution of the solar and wind energy potential and design guidelines for a building skin were developed. The perspective of balancing the increasing energy consumption using renewable energy in urban areas can be visualized positively in the near future.