Distributed consensus-based reactive power sharing in microgrids: A predictive virtual capacitance control technique

Abstract

In microgrids, multiple modular distributed generation (DG) are required to power the system’s loads. Nonetheless, disproportionate reactive power (Q) sharing arises with unequal feeder line impedances of DGs connected to a common bus. Hence, this study proposes a novel method, based on virtual shunt and series capacitances, to regulate both accurate reactive power sharing, and at the same time restore the DG output voltages. The proposed method utilizes a dynamic average consensus algorithm for low-bandwidth communication among the neighbor DGs. The effectiveness of the control scheme is validated through stability analysis, extensive offline simulations and real-time hardware-in-the-loop tests on a microgrid system.