Improved Control Strategy for Bidirectional Single Phase AC-DC Converter in Hybrid AC/DC Microgrid

Abstract

This paper presents the improved control strategy with optimal switching scheme to improve the bidirectional converter's power flow control capability and to allow for different modes of operation in hybrid AC/DC microgrid. Also, this improved control strategy eliminates the need of PI controller for independent reactive power control. With the improvements in digital controllers, it is possible to implement complex control circuitry easily. The performance of bidirectional converter with improved control strategy is verified first in simulation environment and then on lab scale experimental set-up with the control circuit is implemented using hardware in loop in the real-time digital simulation platform. The simulation and experimental results for all the cases show that the controller is highly capable for power transfer between AC and DC grid with very fast response and also control reactive power without additional PI controller. Also, it maintains the current total harmonic distortion (THD) within standard limits.