Novel Control Architectures for Power Electronic Converters in Micro-Grids

化石燃料能源的有限供应，以及全球对气候变化迫在眉睫的日益关注，是导致风能和太阳能成为加拿大增长最快的能源的主要原因。随着可再生能源产量的增加，由于风能和太阳能的间歇性，电网系统的稳定性将受到不利影响。可再生能源的不规律性会引起电网电压和电网频率的波动，这些波动可能会危及系统的稳定性。例如，在德国，一旦太阳能产量达到其总能源产量的8%，他们就开始看到其电网电压和电网频率的大幅波动。在北美，与其他能源相比，风能和太阳能的渗透率较低。目前，风能仅占加拿大电力的3.5%，太阳能占比不到1%。由于风能和太阳能在北美的渗透还很有限，对电网系统的有害影响可以忽略不计。然而，在不久的将来，这些不利影响将不再是微不足道的，因为用可再生能源取代主流发电的紧迫性。因此，随着可再生能源装置的不断增长，将可再生能源纳入电网系统正面临更大的挑战。为了避免电网不稳定，吸收电网波动，在输配网中安装大功率电网稳定器是常用的方法。然而，这种方法有多个缺点：基础设施非常昂贵、效率低下、不可扩展，并且需要大量的维护。提出的研究计划的主要目标是提供解决方案，将积极吸收电网波动和稳定电网系统通过使用电力电子变流器。电力电子变流器是可再生能源系统的必要组成部分，并作为电网接口运行。由于电力电子转换器是可再生能源系统现有基础设施的一部分，因此这种方法的成本和可扩展性比普通方法有了巨大的改进。这项研究旨在为可再生能源系统提供更智能的“下一代”电力电子转换器，以解决上述问题。这些下一代电力电子变流器将利用新的控制系统，使他们能够支持电网系统。因此，本研究计划的主要目标是开发新的先进识别算法和自适应控制方案来实现这些目标。拟议中的研究项目将通过无缝地将可再生能源整合到电网系统中，而无需增加昂贵的电网基础设施，从而直接使加拿大能源部门受益。

The limited supply of fossil fuel-based energies, and growing global concerns about the imminence of climate change are a leading cause as to why wind and solar are the fastest growing sources of energy in Canada. As renewable energy production increases, the stability of the grid system will experience detrimental impacts due to the intermittent nature of wind and solar energy. The irregularity of renewable energy can cause fluctuations in the grid voltage and grid frequency, and these fluctuations may jeopardize system stability. For instance, in Germany, once solar energy production reached 8% of their total energy production, they began to see a significant amount of fluctuations in their grid voltage and grid frequency. In North America, wind and solar energy penetration is low compared to other sources of energy. Currently, wind energy is responsible for producing only 3.5% of electricity, and solar energy accounts for less than 1% in Canada. Since the penetration of wind and solar energy has been limited in North America as of yet, harmful effects on the grid system have been negligible. However, in the near future these adverse effects will no longer be negligible, because of the urgency to replace mainstream power generation with renewable energy. Thus, the integration of renewable energy into the grid system is posing a greater challenge as renewable energy installations continue to grow.In order to avoid instability and absorb the grid fluctuations, the common approach has been to install high power grid stabilizers in the transmission and distribution network. However, this approach has multiple disadvantages: the infrastructure is very costly, inefficient, not scalable, and requires a substantial amount of maintenance. The main objective of the proposed research program is to provide solutions that will actively absorb grid fluctuations and stabilize the grid system through the use of power electronic converters. Power electronic converters are requisite components of renewable energy systems, and operate as a grid interface. Since power electronic converters are a part of the existing infrastructure of renewable energy systems, the cost and scalability of this approach is a vast improvement over the common approach. This research aims to deliver more intelligent “next generation” power electronic converters for renewable energy systems that can address the aforementioned difficulties at the site of origin. These next generation power electronic converters will utilize new control systems that enable them to support the grid system. Thus, the main objective of this research program is to develop novel advanced identification algorithms and adaptive control schemes to achieve these goals. The proposed research program will directly benefit the Canadian energy sector by seamlessly integrating renewable energy into the grid system, without adding costly grid infrastructure.