Control of fluctuating renewable energy sources: energy quality & energy filters

Yan, Zuanhong (2018). Control of fluctuating renewable energy sources: energy quality & energy filters. University of Birmingham. Ph.D.

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Abstract

This doctoral study discusses how to control fluctuating renewable energy sources at converter, unit, and system layers to deliver smoothed power output to the grid. This is particularly relevant to renewable power generation since the output power of many kinds of renewable energy sources have huge fluctuations (e.g. solar, wind and wave) that needs to be properly treated for grid integration. In this research, the energy quality is developed to describe the friendliness and compatibility of power flows/waveforms to the grid, by contrast with the well-known concept of power quality which is used to assess the voltage and current waveforms.
In Chapter 1 & 2, a background introduction and a literature review of studied subjects are presented, respectively. In Chapter 3, the problem of determining the PI parameters in dq decoupling control of voltage source converter (VSC) is studied based on a state-space model. The problems of the conventional method when there is insufficient interface resistance are addressed. New methods are proposed to overcome these drawbacks. In Chapter 4 & 5, energy quality and the energy filters (EFs) are proposed as tools to assess and manage power fluctuations of renewable energy sources. The proposed EFs are energy storage control systems that could be implemented on a variety of energy storage hardware. EFs behave like low-pass filters to the power flows. Finally, in Chapter 6, as an application example of renewable power plant with energy filter control and smoothed power output, a master-slave wave farm system is proposed. The wave farm system uses enlarged rotor inertia of electric machines as self-energy storage devices.

Type of Work:

Thesis (Doctorates > Ph.D.)

Award Type:

Doctorates > Ph.D.

Supervisor(s):