Electrical and Computer Engineering Commons^™

Microgrid Renewable Energy Integration, Do Quang Thanh Vo

Electrical Engineering

The Microgrid is a small-scale electrical system that is designed to give Cal Poly students hands-on experience on power generation, system protection, distribution, and automation that would otherwise be very difficult to experiment in a large-scale model.

To closely replicate the modern electrical grid, a renewable energy source shall be added to the Microgrid in conjunction with the existing synchronous generators. Electrical engineering student, Virginia Yan initiated this effort, namely Grid-Tied Solar System project [1], by designing and constructing a set of solar panels and microinverter for future connection to the Microgrid. The scope of Virginia’s project was, however, limited …

Control Strategy For A Small-Scale Microgrid Based On Battery Energy Storage System-Virtual Synchronous Generator (Bess-Vsg), Wei Gao

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

As one of widely deployed renewable energy resources, PV power is playing a very important role in microgrids today. It has advantages such as making the best of natural solar energy and being friendly to our environment. In this thesis, solar PV based microgrid is studied using modeling and simulation. Microgrid can run in either grid-connected-mode or islanded-mode. However, there are also some disadvantages for solar power. For solar panel, its output is influenced by weather conditions such as illumination intensity and temperature. In addition, during the control process of grid-connected mode, it is hard to guarantee its output power …

Energy Management And Control Of Smart Power Distribution Systems, Eric Galvan

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

With the development of distributed energy resources (DERs) and advancements in technology, microgrids (MGs) appear primed to become an even more integral part of the future distribution grid. In this transition to the smart power grid of the future, MGs must be properly managed and controlled to allow efficient integration of DERs. Over the past years, there has been rapid adoption of roof-top solar photovoltaic (PV) and battery electric vehicles (BEVs). Although roof-top solar PV and BEVs can provide environmental benefits (e.g., reduction of emissions), they also create various challenges for power system operators. For example, roof-top solar PV generation …

A Distributed Real-Time Short-Term Solar Irradiation Forecasting Network For Photovoltaic Systems, Michael Adelbert Gacusan

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Solar irradiation forecasting is essential for PV connected electrical grids to maintain reliability, stability, and effective matching of real-time demand to power distribution. This research paper develops and evaluates proposed forecasting methods using wireless sensor networks. Each node of the network is capable of monitoring illuminance data and communicate it through RF and/or WiFi. The nodes are calibrated with respect to irradiance data from an industry-standard pyranometer. Power consumption of each node type is also collected at different operating states. The proposed sensor network can estimate a cloud motion vector or a cloud shadow’s speed and direction from the data …

Grid-Tied Solar System, Virginia Yan

Electrical Engineering

Distribution level solar energy generation has gained importance and popularity, because it helps create a sustainable electricity system while reducing the harmful environmental impacts our current power systems have. This project proposes an alternative energy source, a laboratory-scale grid-connected photovoltaic system. A KC120-1 solar panel produces 120 Watts maximum. A grid-tied solar power inverter does DC-to-AC conversion and minimizes energy transfer losses. The inverter also has an anti-islanding feature, which senses a power outage and prevents back-feeding through isolating the circuit. The circuit breakers isolate electrical components and protect the circuit. Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories SEL-751 feeder protection relay and SEL-735 …

Multidimensional Optimal Droop Control For Dc Microgrids In Military Applications, Kaitlyn J. Bunker, Michael D. Cook, Wayne Weaver, Gordon Parker

Michigan Tech Publications, Part 1

Reliability is a key consideration when microgrid technology is implemented in military applications. Droop control provides a simple option without requiring communication between microgrid components, increasing the control system reliability. However, traditional droop control does not allow the microgrid to utilize much of the power available from a solar resource. This paper applies an optimal multidimensional droop control strategy for a solar resource connected in a microgrid at a military patrol base. Simulation and hardware-in-the-loop experiments of a sample microgrid show that much more power from the solar resource can be utilized, while maintaining the system’s bus voltage around a …

Optimal Multidimensional Droop Control For Wind Resources In Dc Microgrids, Kaitlyn J. Bunker, Wayne Weaver

Michigan Tech Publications, Part 1

The inclusion of electricity generation from wind in microgrids presents an important opportunity in modern electric power systems. Various control strategies can be pursued for wind resources connected in microgrids, and droop control is a promising option since communication between microgrid components is not required. Traditional droop control does have the drawback of not allowing much or all of the available wind power to be utilized in the microgrid. This paper presents a novel droop control strategy, modifying the traditional approach and building an optimal droop surface at a higher dimension. A method for determining the optimal droop control surface …

Circuit Breaker Module, Garvin Yee, Yei Trinh

Electrical Engineering

The circuit breaker module for this design project is a proof of concept that demonstrates the functionality, feasibility, and attainability of a consumer grade power systems analysis device suitable for college laboratory use. The goal of this project was to create the final iteration of a module that has been developed and refined over the course of previous years. The Cal Poly Electrical Engineering Department intends to use this design to produce circuit breaker modules intended for fault analysis. With the current changes made to the previous modules, the current circuit breaker is lighter, safer, and more universally reproducible. The …

Protection, Automation, And Frequency Stability Analysis Of A Laboratory Microgrid System, Christopher Eric Osborn

Master's Theses

Due to increasing changes in the power industry, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo's electrical engineering department introduced a set of initiatives to adequately equip students with the skills and knowledge to interact with new technologies. Specifically, the department proposed a microgrid and power systems protection and automation laboratory to strengthen students' knowledge of microprocessor-based relays. This paper outlines a microgrid laboratory system that fulfills the initiative's goal and proposes a collection of laboratory experiments for inclusion in a new laboratory course at Cal Poly. The experiments provide students with practical experience using Schweitzer Engineering Laboratory (SEL) relays and teach fundamental …

Modeling And Analysis Of Cal Poly Microgrid, Matthew A. Guevara

Master's Theses

Microgrids—miniature versions of the electrical grid are becoming increasingly more popular as advancements in technologies, renewable energy mandates, and decreased costs drive communities to adopt them. The modern microgrid has capabilities of generating, distributing, and regulating the flow of electricity, capable of operating in both grid-connected and islanded (disconnected) conditions. This paper utilizes ETAP software in the analysis, simulation, and development of the Cal Poly microgrid. Additionally, an ETAP power system protection tutorial is created to aid students entering the power industry. Microprocessor-based relays are heavily utilized in both the ETAP model and hardware implementation of the system. Case studies …

Communication Based Control For Dc Microgrids, Mahmoud S. Saleh, Yusef Esa, Ahmed Mohamed

Publications and Research

Centralized communication-based control is one of the main methods that can be implemented to achieve autonomous advanced energy management capabilities in DC microgrids. However, its major limitation is the fact that communication bandwidth and computation resources are limited in practical applications. This can be often improved by avoiding redundant communications and complex computations. In this paper, an autonomous communication-based hybrid state/event driven control scheme is proposed. This control scheme is hierarchical and heuristic, such that on the primary control level, it encompasses state-driven local controllers, and on the secondary control level, an event-driven MG centralized controller (MGCC) is used. This …

Optimal Planning Of Microgrid-Integrated Battery Energy Storage, Ibrahim S. Alsaidan

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Battery energy storage (BES) is a core component in reliable, resilient, and cost-effective operation of microgrids. When appropriately sized, BES can provide the microgrid with both economic and technical benefits. Besides the BES size, it is found that there are mainly three planning parameters that impact the BES performance, including the BES integration configuration, technology, and depth of discharge.

In this dissertation, the impact of each one of these parameters on the microgrid-integrated BES planning problem is investigated. Three microgrid-integrated BES planning models are developed to individually find the optimal values for the aforementioned parameters. These three microgrid-integrated BES planning …

Design Of A Multiagent-Based Smart Microgrid System For Building Energy And Comfort Management, Batyrkhan Omarov, Aigerim Altayeva

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

Modern intelligent control system design methodology in the electric power industry and their features are considered when providing the required comfort in multizone buildings with the use of multiagent power consumption and comfort management systems. Such a control system covers all the monitored zones of a building and, if necessary, can provide the greatest possible overall comfort in the building while reducing the required electric power. The purpose of this study was to develop a comfort management system in a multizoned building that can provide comfort while reducing the required electric power.

Q-Axis Current Perturbation Based Active Islanding Detection For Converter Interfaced Distributed Generators, Suman Murugesan, Venkatakirthiga Murali

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

Thanks to the incessant developments in technology towards extracting electric power from renewable energy resources, incorporation of distributed generators has been gaining great importance in recent years. The key expedients for such power generation include reduction in power loss and improvement in the power quality and reliability. In spite of the numerous advantages, it is mandatory to ascertain the island formation and shut down the distributed generators (DGs) during an unplanned islanding. An analyzing technique subsequent to an active islanding detection technique is proposed in this work for faster and accurate detection of island formation. The proposed technique is investigated …

Grey Wolf Optimization-Based Optimum Energy-Management And Battery-Sizing Method For Grid-Connected Microgrids, Kutaiba Sabah Nimma, Monaaf D. A. Al-Falahi, Hung Duc Nguyen, S. D. G. Jayasinghe, Thair Mahmoud, Michael Negnevitsky

Research outputs 2014 to 2021

In the revolution of green energy development, microgrids with renewable energy sources such as solar, wind and fuel cells are becoming a popular and effective way of controlling and managing these sources. On the other hand, owing to the intermittency and wide range of dynamic responses of renewable energy sources, battery energy-storage systems have become an integral feature of microgrids. Intelligent energy management and battery sizing are essential requirements in the microgrids to ensure the optimal use of the renewable sources and reduce conventional fuel utilization in such complex systems. This paper presents a novel approach to meet these requirements …

Practical Dwell Times For Switched System Stability With Smart Grid Application, William Roy St. Pierre

Masters Theses

"Switched systems are encountered throughout many engineering disciplines, but confirming their stability is a challenging task. Even if each subsystem is asymptotically stable, certain switching sequences may exist that drive the overall system states into unacceptable regions. This thesis contains a process that grants stability under switching to switched systems with multiple operating points. The method linearizes a switched system about its distinct operating points, and employs multiple Lyapunov functions to produce modal dwell times that yield stability. This approach prioritizes practicality and is designed to be useful for large systems with many states and subsystems due to its ease …

Microgrid Energy Management With Flexibility Constraints: A Data-Driven Solution Method, Okan Ciftci

LSU Master's Theses

Microgrid energy management is a challenging and important problem in modern power systems. Several deterministic and stochastic models have been proposed in the literature for the microgrid energy management problem. However, more accurate models are required to enhance flexibility of the microgrids when accounting for renewable energy and load uncertainties. This thesis proposes key contributions to solve the energy management problem for smart building (or small-scale microgrid). In Chapter 3, a deterministic energy management model is presented taking into account system flexibility requirements. Energy storage systems are deployed to enhance the grid flexibility and ramping capability. The objective function of …

Modeling And Simulation Of Microgrid, Ahmad Alzahrani, Mehdi Ferdowsi, Pourya Shamsi, Cihan H. Dagli

Electrical and Computer Engineering Faculty Research & Creative Works

Complex computer systems and electric power grids share many properties of how they behave and how they are structured. A microgrid is a smaller electric grid that contains several homes, energy storage units, and distributed generators. The main idea behind microgrids is the ability to work even if the main grid is not supplying power. That is, the energy storage unit and distributed generation will supply power in that case, and if there is excess in power production from renewable energy sources, it will go to the energy storage unit. Therefore, the electric grid becomes decentralized in terms of control …

Smart Inverter Control And Operation For Distributed Energy Resources, Ahmad F. Tazay

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The motivation of this research is to carry out the control and operation of smart inverters and voltage source converters (VSC) for distributed energy resources (DERs) such as photovoltaic (PV), battery, and plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEV). The main contribution of the research includes solving a couple of issues for smart grids by controlling and implementing multifunctions of VSC and smart inverter as well as improving the operational scheme of the microgrid. The work is mainly focused on controlling and operating of smart inverter since it promises a new technology for the future microgrid. Two major applications of the smart …

Realization Of A High Power Microgrid Based On Voltage Source Converters, Yusi Liu

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Microgrid concepts are gradually becoming more popular because they are expected to interface with renewable energies, increase end users’ reliability and resiliency, and promote seamless integration of distributed generators (DG) and energy storage units [1]. Most units are connected through power electronics interfaces, such as ac-dc, dc-dc, and dc-ac converters. The converter design and control are critical to the stability and efficiency of a microgrid.

A microgrid may operate in either gird connected mode or islanded mode [1]. In terms of stability, the grid connected mode is less challenging compared to the islanded mode of operation due to the nearly …

Microgrid Protection Student Laboratory, Ian Hellman-Wylie, Joey Navarro

Electrical Engineering

To better prepare students for careers in the electric power industry, specifically in the discipline of power system protection, the Electrical Engineering Department at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo proposed an initiative calling for the creation of new laboratory curriculum that uses microprocessor-based relays to give students hands-on experience in the application of protection theory. This report describes the creation of a system that meets this need by providing a laboratory-scale power system that demonstrates the use of common protective relays and protection schemes. This system provides a platform for laboratory coursework using protective relays for transmission line, transformer, and …

Linear Quadratic Optimal Control For A Cascaded Converters-Based Microgrid, Amlam Niragire

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

There is a constant transformation of the electric grid due to an ongoing interest in the deployment of renewable energy resources and electric microgrid formation. This transformation, though advantageous in many ways, poses great challenges for the energy industry and there must be a constant improvement in modeling, simulation, analysis and control techniques in order to characterize and optimize the system design and operation. In this light, the scope of this thesis is focused on developing a linear model, analyzing the stability and designing an optimal linear quadratic regulator (LQR) for a microgrid system. The microgrid system used is inspired …

Risk Optimized Microgrid Resource Management, Thomas William Cashel Iii

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This thesis proposes a risk based price adjustment method for a day ahead scheduling of a distribution side tiered community microgrid within a transactive energy style market. The system is organized into a master controller and local controller confïguration to simulate behind meter activity that is not visible to the master controller. Conditional value at risk is used to asses the risk of distributed energy resources in each local controller and the risk for each local controller is aggregated providing each local controller a single risk value. Each device's, or local controller's, risk value is used to adjust the price …

Optimal Determination Of Island Boundaries Besides The Optimal Placement Of D-Statcom Devices And Dg Units, Sadeq Rabie, Hossein Afrakhte

Turkish Journal of Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences

In this study, integration of three important concepts of distributed generation, D-FACTS devices, and microgrids are evaluated. The performance of a microgrid is dependent on its location, capacity, and placement of DG units and D-FACTS devices. In this paper a new method is proposed to simultaneously determine the optimal number, location, and capacity of DG units and D-STATCOM devices and optimal boundaries of electrical islands in the independent mode of microgrids. The main objective is to minimize the economic costs. The optimal locations of DG units and D-STATCOM devices should be determined to maximize the DG capacities with minimum loss …

Design And Modeling For Dc Nanogrids, Ormond D. Castle

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

Smart grids were constructed as a means of communication to the electric grid through computer and other information technologies. This line of communication acts as gauge for a more accurate reading of power consumed. A nano grid is a model version of a smart grid with the ability to function as separate power generator. Such feature allows for this grid to power single loads and apply for special applications. A DC-DC converter was designed to apply to a nano grid which is a form of a smart grid. The converter was a single-input-multi-output converter which is taking one dc voltage …

A Hybrid State/Event Driven Communication-Based Control For Dc Microgrids, Yusef Esa

Dissertations and Theses

The U.S. electric power industry is undergoing unprecedented changes triggered by the growing electricity demand, and the national efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Moreover, there is a call for increased power grid resiliency, survivability and self-healing capabilities. As a result of these challenges, the smart grid concept emerged. One of the main pillars of the smart grid is microgrids. In this thesis, the technical merits of clustering multiple microgrids during blackouts on the overall stability and supply availability have been investigated.

We propose to use the existing underground distribution grid infrastructure, if applicable, during blackouts to form microgrid clusters. …

Multi-Time Scale Control Of Demand Flexibility In Smart Distribution Networks, Bishnu P. Bhattarai, Kurt S. Myers, Birgitte Bak-Jensen, Sumit Paudyal

Michigan Tech Publications, Part 1

This paper presents a multi-timescale control strategy to deploy electric vehicle (EV) demand flexibility for simultaneously providing power balancing, grid congestion management, and economic benefits to participating actors. First, an EV charging problem is investigated from consumer, aggregator, and distribution system operator’s perspectives. A hierarchical control architecture (HCA) comprising scheduling, coordinative, and adaptive layers is then designed to realize their coordinative goal. This is realized by integrating multi-time scale controls that work from a day-ahead scheduling up to real-time adaptive control. The performance of the developed method is investigated with high EV penetration in a typical residential distribution grid. The …

Optimized Sizing And Placing Of Distributed Energy Resources (Ders) In An Island Microgrid Using Der-Cam, Bhuwan B. Bastola

Electrical and Computer Engineering ETDs

The electric grid at La Gomera, an island in the Canary archipelago, has been the subject of interest in optimized integration of Distributed Energy Resources (DERs) primarily because of high distribution losses and concerns about complying with emission regulations. Consequently, the utility that operates the island power system wishes to mitigate the problem with installation of renewable and distributed energy sources like PV and battery, which is the focus of this research.

Specifically, the focus of this thesis is to use Distributed Energy Resource - Customer Adoption Model (DER-CAM) to optimize the installation of PV and battery in terms of …

Impact Of Clustering Microgrids On Their Stability And Resilience During Blackouts, Mahmoud S. Saleh, Ammar Althaibani, Yusef Esa, Yassine Mhandi, Ahmed Mohamed

Publications and Research

In this paper, the impact of clustering multiple microgrids during blackouts, on their stability and supply availability, will be investigated. Microgrids have the capability of satisfying their emergency loads during blackouts. However, distributed energy resources (DERs)-dominated microgrids are affected by the uncertainty of their input energy supply, e.g. impact of solar irradiance on photovoltaic (PV) output. Moreover, an individual islanded microgrid is prone to instability issues due to large sudden load/generation changes. In order to increase the supply security, and enhance system stability, we propose to use the existing distribution grid infrastructure, if applicable, during blackouts to form microgrid clusters. …

A Methodology For Cooperation Between Electric Utilities And Consumers For Microgrid Utilization Based On A Systems Engineering Approach, Franklin E. Pacheco Chiguano

Open Access Theses

In recent years, the energy market has experienced important challenges in its structure and requirements of its actors, such as the necessity for more reliable electric service, energy efficiency, environmental care practices, and the incorporation of decentralized power generation based on distributed energy resources (DER). Given this context, microgrids offer several advantages to the grid and its actors. However, few microgrid projects have been implemented, and the participation of electric utilities is lower than the expected. Hence, this research explores how electric utility - customer interactions can accommodate mutual benefits for both parties through the proposal of a Microgrid Reference …