In-situ reconfiguration for flexible distribution of energy and storage resources

Abstract

Flexible Distribution of EneRgy and Storage Resources (FDERS) is a new framework recently proposed for integrating various distributed resources in a power system. It provides flexibility in rearranging the interconnected system resources into formations in order to achieve greater sustainability as observed in the V-shape formation of a bird flock or peloton formation of a cycling racing team. One of the characteristic features of FDERS is in enabling distributed resources reconfiguration in-situ, i.e., the resources demonstrate a different dynamic behavior relative to each other than their (original) physical `electrical' location otherwise would suggest. This paper presents various schemes for in-situ reconfiguration along with their advantages. It is achieved by means of developing novel techniques employing special functions of compensating reactances. These techniques help in achieving greater sustainability goals like optimal energy storage deployment, enhanced controllability, improved system robustness and increased lifetime of the distributed energy and storage resources. In-situ reconfiguration is demonstrated for within-parallel, parallel-to-series and series-to-parallel connections. Finally, a comparison is also presented between physical and in-situ and reconfigurations.