NSF Award
2405252
This NSF EAGER project aims to explore the foundation, and to take the guiding steps toward establishing a taxonomy of optimal control architectures and design algorithms for power electronic converters that are employed to integrate diverse energy systems (such as solar photovoltaics, wind, and battery energy systems) into the electricity network. The project will bring transformative changes to the existing control systems and design algorithms utilized to interface energy systems with the utility grid. This milestone will be achieved by employing robust structures based on the state feedback approach and extended quadratic designs of optimal control theory. The intellectual merits of the project include the development of control structures, step-by-step optimal control design algorithms, and modular simulation testing models for four specified cases, and the development of automated controller synthesis and design. The broader impacts of the project include incentives for the inverter manufacturers toward more consistent adoption of these controllers, thereby enabling engineers to perform more accurate and reliable power system stability analysis. The project will also promote curriculum development and outreach activities for K-12 students.<br/><br/>Inverter-based resources (IBRs) are increasingly being used to address issues with the existing power grid for integrating more renewables and battery energy storage systems. The project will consider four types of IBRs, including single-phase, three-phase, grid-following (GFL) and grid-forming (GFM) systems. Diverse resource dynamics, substantially fast responses, and low over-current limits, combined with the lack of a standard framework of controllers and designs, have posed significant challenges to the widespread adoption of such technologies. Specifically, the lack of such frameworks has seriously impeded stability analysis and response characterization of a power system with high penetration of IBRs. This project will take initial guiding steps toward addressing these issues by developing the first generation of systematic controllers regarding their structure and design algorithms, with automated controller designs.<br/><br/>This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.
