Prasenjit Basak

Microgrid from an Indian perspective

This is a review paper discussing the concept of microgrids based on renewable energy & its relevance from Indian perspective. It presents the needs & application areas of microgrids, which if properly implemented and exploited can usher an era of energy revolution for the worlds second most populated country & meet the energy requirement of our countrys millions of people, who still live in darkness along with a decades old aging power infrastructure insufficient to meet an ever increasing stress. The paper also presents the various benefits, challenges & management issues that would be faced in building any Microgrid plan. A brief discussion is also given on Indias movement towards smart Microgrids, related developmental initiatives & programs which are in pipeline. At last, the author proposes a step by step procedural way for establishing a Microgrid in India or any part of world.

Behavior of fault current in microgrid systems

With the integration of DGs to utility side, drastic changes in fault current occurs across the system at different locations in a microgrid. In this paper different types of faults in microgrid system are investigated through simulation using Simulink-MatLab. The impacts of inverter interfaced DGs on fault current and importance of adaptive protection issues for islanded and utility microgrid are studied in this paper. Nature of fault currents has been observed at several locations in sample microgrid system through simulation.

Estimation of average yearly power developed by a solar microgrid using Simulink model

The power developed by the solar microgrid is not constant for a particular year, it depends upon the weather conditions around the year of the specific location where the solar microgrid is operating. It is however necessary to estimate the annual average power developed by the particular microgrid before physically installing microgrid at that location. The programming based model of the photovoltaic generator is developed by utilizing various governing equations of the photovoltaic cell and the microgrid model consisting of two such generators is then simulated for yearly solar insolation and temperature data of Mumbai, Bangalore, Kolkata and New Delhi. The yearly average power curves are hence obtained and their comparisons are made based upon the analysis. The above analysis helps us to estimate the rating of the loads to be connected across the microgrid. The whole work of programming and simulations is carried out in Simulink in MATLAB 2014 software.

Active and reactive power control using droop characteristics controller in a microgrid

The microgrid may have ac or dc microsources present in its configuration. The most common dc microsource used in the microgrid is the photovoltaic generator whose dc output level does not remain constant for 24 hours in a day. But in most of the control configuration of microgrid the dc microsource is represented as an ideal dc source which needs modification in practical scenario. In the work undertaken in this paper, the fixed dc source is replaced by a photovoltaic generator in a single phase control configuration of the microgrid using Simulink. The dc output level of this generator now depends upon the solar insolation, ambient temperature and shaded cells in a photovoltaic module. The sample solar data of Patiala, India region is considered for the present work. The change in open circuit voltage of photovoltaic generator, active and reactive power across loads are recorded in Simulation. The proposed controller unit uplifts the power level across the loads and the performance of the same is verified through Simulation of the proposed single phase microgrid model using Simulink MATLAB software.

A typical layout of microgrid and scope of its industrial application

The manufacturing industries consume almost one third of total energy throughout the world. In this sector, energy costs comprise a large amount of total production costs, so overall cost might be lowered by their own efforts for power generation without compromising the environmental hazards and enhancing the energy efficiency which is a challenging task. The authors have proposed an eco-friendly approach for power generation through low voltage microgrid in localized area of an industry. A typical layout of AC microgrid is proposed especially in industrial application to reduce the carbon footprint as much as possible under normal and emergency cases of power availability. The main objective is to investigate the performance of AC microgrid under gridconnected and islanded conditions without sacrificing the critical loads. The simulation results are obtained to estimate the continuous power flow to the load using Matlab-Simulink software environment and found satisfactory.

Fractionalization of microgrid protection system through detection of zero sequence component of fault current

The fault current at a particular node in microgrid system varies depending upon its grid connected and islanded mode of operations. In this scenario microgrid the function of microgrid central protection unit becomes challenging to maintain its simplicity and reliability during protection coordination. To make protection system more reliable and to minimize complexity and dependency of central adaptive protection, fractionalization of microgrid protection is proposed in this paper showing detection of only load side faults independently based on zero sequence current components. The proposed algorithm is verified in a Simulink model of a three phase AC microgrid and results are found acceptable.

Modelling and simulation of PV-Biogas based power generation system and its scopes of industrial applications: A case study on Punjab in India

A microgrid system based on renewable energy resources is efficient, cheap and more reliable as compared to system based on single energy source. Most promising renewable energy resources such as solar and wind depend on unpredictable climate conditions. Sometimes wind is stronger whereas solar power is less or vice-versa. This paper proposes that biomass can be used as a controlled energy source which can compensate when solar energy supply is low. Integration of biomass with photovoltaic (PV) system will improve the reliability of the system. Various types of biomass can be utilized in order to generate electrical power. This paper explores the present energy scenario of Punjab in India highlighting the potential of renewable energy resources including biomass as a case study in Punjab. An approach towards integration of biomass based energy resource with solar energy based system is proposed through simulation using Matlab. The scopes of industrial applications of PV and biomass based hybrid systems are explored.