A hardware in the loop testbed for adaptive protection of non-inteconnected island systems with high RES penetration

The energy production of island systems relies on diesel generators, which are costly and environmentally polluting. Hybrid solutions, including renewable energy generators, energy storage units and advanced control methods can achieve very high penetration of renewables in such systems. Nevertheless, such solutions need to address the concerns that rise in the protection system due to replacement of synchronous generators with inverter based resources in the generation mix. Adaptive protection schemes can be used to address these concerns. The testing of these schemes is also crucial to evaluate their performance, build the trust of system operators in them or train personnel in smart protection system concepts. This work aims to address protection concerns in island systems, describe an adaptive protection scheme, using data from an actual island system, and finally propose an advanced hardware in the loop (HIL) test bed for testing and evaluation using industrial equipment.