Frequency Stability of Hierarchically Controlled Hybrid Photovoltaic-Battery-Hydropower Microgrids

Hybrid photovoltaic (PV) -battery-hydropower microgrids can be considered to enhance electricity accessibility and availability in remote areas. However, the coexistence of different renewable energy sources with different inertias and control strategies may affect system stability. In this paper, a hierarchical controller for hybrid PV-battery-hydropower microgrid is proposed in order to achieve the parallel operation of hydropower and PV-battery system with different rates, and to guarantee power sharing performance among PV voltage controlled inverters, while the required power to hydropower-based local grid is supplied. In this case, the PV-battery system will operate as a PQ bus to inject the desired active and reactive powers to local grid, while the hydropower station will act as a slack bus which maintains its voltage amplitude and frequency. An integrated small-signal state-space model is derived to analyze the system stability of the hybrid microgrid. The simulation results show system frequency and voltage stability for a hybrid microgrid demonstration which includes 2 MWp PV installations, a 15.2 MWh battery system, and a 12.8 MVA hydropower plant. Experimental results on a small-scale laboratory prototype verify the validity of the theoretical analysis and proposed control strategy.