Fast and Secure Operation of Voltage Source Inverter based DERs using Model Predictive Droop Control

Reliability of the power grid can be improved by the use of microgrids (MGs) concept, which regulates the voltage and frequency at the point of common coupling (PCC) during normal and/or faulty conditions. Droop characteristics based hierarchical control strategies are commonly used in MGs, where power converters can operate in parallel. However, the need of multiple control loops not only adds complexity to the controller design, but also reduces the dynamic response of the system. In the future power system, grid-tied converters with fast dynamic response are desired to handle the uncertainties induced by high penetration of distributed energy resources. Therefore, this paper presents a novel model predictive control to ensure fast dynamic response of high power three-level converters in stand-alone operating mode as well as grid-tied operating mode. The proposed controller is applied to a MG which consists of a solar inverter connected in parallel with an energy storage system to the PCC, where a local load is tied. Both simulation and experimental results are presented to demonstrate robustness and the high dynamic performance of the proposed controller under rapidly changing atmospheric conditions and different grid operating modes.