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  1. null (Ed.)
    This paper addresses a critical question pertaining to manufacturing sustainability: is it economically viable to implement an island microgrid to power a flow shop system under power demand and supply uncertainty? Though many studies on microgrid sizing are available, the majority assume the microgrid is interconnected with main grid. This paper aims to size wind turbine, photovoltaic and battery storage to energize a multi-stage flow shop system in island mode. A mixed-integer, non-linear programming model is formulated to optimize the renewable portfolio and capacity with the goal of minimizing the levelized cost of energy. The island microgrid is tested in three locations with diverse climate profiles. The results show that net zero energy flow shop production is economically feasible in the areas where the average wind speed exceed 8 m/s at 80-meter tower height, or the battery cost drops below $100,000/MWh. Sensitivity analyses are further carried out with respect to installation cost, demand response program, production scalability, and weather seasonality. 
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  2. null (Ed.)
    A variety of methods have been proposed to assist the integration of microgrid in flow shop systems with the goal of attaining eco-friendly operations. There is still a lack of integrated planning models in which renewable portfolio, microgrid capacity and production plan are jointly optimized under power demand and generation uncertainty. This paper aims to develop a two-stage, mixed-integer programming model to minimize the levelized cost of energy of a flow shop powered by onsite renewables. The first stage minimizes the annual energy use subject to a job throughput requirement. The second stage aims at sizing wind turbine, solar panels and battery units to meet the hourly electricity needs during a year. Climate analytics are employed to characterize the stochastic wind and solar capacity factor on an hourly basis. The model is tested in four locations with a wide range of climate conditions. Three managerial insights are derived from the numerical experiments. First, time-of-use tariff significantly stimulates the wind penetration in locations with medium or low wind speed. Second, regardless of the climate conditions, large-scale battery storage units are preferred under time-of-use rate but it is not the case under a net metering policy. Third, wind- and solar-based microgrid is scalable and capable of meeting short-term demand variation and long-term load growth with a stable energy cost rate. 
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