Abstract
Electrical power grids are rapidly evolving into smart grids, with smart homes also making an important contribution to this. In fact, the well-known and emerging technologies of renewables, energy storage systems and electric mobility are each time more distributed throughout the power grid and included in smart homes. In such circumstances, since these technologies are natively operating in DC, it is predictable for a revolution in the electrical grid craving a convergence to DC grids. Nevertheless, traditional loads natively operating in AC will continue to be used, highlighting the importance of hybrid AC/DC grids. Considering this new paradigm, this paper has as main innovation points the proposed control algorithms regarding the role of front-end AC/DC converters in hybrid AC/DC smart homes, demonstrating their importance for providing unipolar or bipolar DC grids for interfacing native DC technologies, such as renewables and electric mobility, including concerns regarding the power quality from a smart grid point of view. Furthermore, the paper presents a clear description of the proposed control algorithms, aligned with distinct possibilities of complementary operation of front-end AC/DC converters in the perspective of smart homes framed within smart grids, e.g., enabling the control of smart homes in a coordinated way. The analysis and experimental results confirmed the suitability of the proposed innovative operation modes for hybrid AC/DC smart homes, based on two different AC/DC converters in the experimental validation.
Highlights
Nowadays, more than ever, electrical grids are in an incessant evolution caused by the increasing dissemination of new technologies, which are forcing the changing of a centralized to a decentralized paradigm targeting sustainable and smarter electrical grids [1,2]
Regarding in particular electric mobility, the impact and contextualization in different scenarios are extensively considered as a hot topic of investigation [5,6], which is valid for proposing new valences for energy markets, including power management, efficiency and support of ancillary services [7]
Such unification presents a set of advantages, but cannot neglect power quality since it is a fundamental pillar for smart homes and for smart grids [14]
Summary
More than ever, electrical grids are in an incessant evolution caused by the increasing dissemination of new technologies, which are forcing the changing of a centralized to a decentralized paradigm targeting sustainable and smarter electrical grids [1,2]. Both situations can be combined, i.e., the front-end AC/DC converter can produce, at the same time, reactive power for both smart home and grid.
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