FACILITY FOR DEVELOPMENT AND TESTING OF NETWORKED POWER ELECTRONICS BUILDING BLOCKS CONTROLS
Abstract
We propose to enhance our capability for developing networked controls for microgrids (ship power systems) by adding a wide-bandwidth 100 kVA power interface and electronic load to our existing real-time simulation environment. This will support power experiments with dynamic system events compatible with power electronics converters switching at speeds in excess of 100kHz. The University of South Carolina performs research in the area of power electronics control both at the power electronic converter and systems of converters levels. Current research activities are aimed at networked power electronics control systems, a key component to enable the Navy vision of a Power Electronics Power Distribution System (PEPDS) in which all major energy sources and sinks are coupled via high speed modular power converters. It is comprised of Power Electronic Building Blocks (PEBBs) with networked control in order to enable energy flow control in a much faster and dynamic manner than possible when system coordinating control is performed at higher (slower) system control layers. The goal of future naval shipboard power systems is the ability to manage energy flow with sufficient flexibility to accommodate future platform requirements such as, better survivability, continuity, and support of demanding loads. To attain the future Naval vision with respect to shipboard energy management, shipboard power and energy management systems must coordinate operation of all major components in real-time at the most fundamental control level, and thus at the fastest time scale possible. Our team has specialized in networked control of microgrids and real-time modeling and simulation, and our laboratory infrastructure provides the latest digital platforms, real-time simulation and communication technology. The real-time control platforms can be coupled with power hardware into order to evaluate and refine controls developed for power electronics systems in a hardware-in-the-loop environment provided a sufficiently high-bandwidth power amplifier is available. However, existing infrastructure for coupling our real-time simulators to the power hardware test-bed and for coupling to very fast switching power conversion equipment, such as the Silicon Carbide based PEBB-1000, does not provide sufficient bandwidth to test the fast energy flow schemes enabled by PEPDS. We are proposing the addition of an EGSTON CSU100 - 1GAMP4 100kW high-bandwidth power amplifier that is capable of interfacing to both our OPAL-RT simulator and our custom FPGA based real-time simulators via high speed fiber-optic interface. In addition, a highly programmable CHROMA load bank will be added to the power distribution test system providing a capability to mimic complex load profiles. This equipment in conjunction with existing infrastructure provides an advanced hardware-in-the-loop capability. It will enable us to run system scenarios and collect data for refinement of high-speed network based distributed controls at application control bandwidths up to 15kHz, the target range for systems with 100kHz switching converters. This will reduce risk and iterative development cycles when transitioning the control architecture and algorithms to larger scale PEBB based systems. It will also be used for generating data to train stochastic models of PEBB systems that we can apply in model-based control scheme research and development as well as models used in real-time Digital Twin development. A key investment by ONR via this DURIP will enable the University of South Carolina to conduct truly unique and innovative research in control of converters and converter-based systems such as Power Electronic Power Distribution Systems. This new infrastructure will help us to meet the needs of the Office of Naval Research in assessing the validity and efficacy of control concepts for systems such as PEPDS in a highly flexible and realistic environment that is appropriate for Naval applications.
Document Details
- Document Type
- DoD Grant Award
- Publication Date
- Sep 11, 2020
- Source ID
- N000142012830
Entities
People
- Herbert L. Ginn
Organizations
- Office of Naval Research
- United States Navy
- University of South Carolina