Smart Inverters Doug Danley

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Advanced Power Electronics and the Future Grid Douglas Danley

Cooperative Research Network, NRECA Presented at: Utility Solar Conference 29 April 2014











More than 900 nonfor-profit electric cooperatives Covering more than 70% of the US land area Serving more than 42 Million consumers in 47 states Accounting for approximately 12% of all electricity usage in the US Primarily residential, commercial and agricultural with increasing growth in metro areas.

• Many solar projects installed or underway – ranging from PV water pumping systems to utility-scale PPA systems.

Solar at Co-ops • SUNDA Project – 14 co-ops installing more than 20 MW of utility-owned PV. • “Community Solar” resonates with co-op business model and is increasingly popular. • Many co-ops serve military bases and government facilities has led to increased interest in solar and micro-grids.

Solar at Co-ops – The Challenges • Integration into distribution systems • 7 meters per mile on average • Primarily long radial distribution lines, but with many exceptions • Concern over effects of intermittent widely distributed sources on lines • Coordination with other efforts such as conservation voltage reduction, AMI, smart feeder switching

Advanced Power Electronics

• Goals are Safe, Reliable, Affordable energy. • Certain functions described in IEEE 1547.8 and IEEE 1547a and implemented in distributed generation can minimize effects on the grid – – – –

Volt/VAR control, low voltage and low frequency ride through, ramping controls and active curtailment

• Must be cost effective compared with other options such as Edge-of-Grid devices (Varentec) and even just switched capacitors.

Challenges for Advanced Power Electronics • Need better understanding of how these functions affect operation of the system under different circumstances and at different time scales. • Communications with distributed devices is more challenging for many co-ops because of sparse systems. Use of customer-based internet is problematic, especially in rural areas. • Integration with other utility systems such as SCADA, GIS and OMS is critical – this can be managed through MultiSpeak™ Standards. • Questions remain about what level to control. Should utilities have data and control access to privately owned roof-top PV systems, or only to larger, more centralized systems?

Related CRN Projects • SUNDA – reducing the barriers to deployment of utility-owned PV systems • OMF – giving utilities the tools to evaluate SmartGrid technologies and economics • Essence – Addressing Cyber Security and Data Analytics for the future grid

SOLAR UTILITY NETWORK DEPLOYMENT ACCELERATION • SUNDA Goal: Reduce barriers to implementation of utilityowned, utility-scale solar PV systems • • • • • •

Standardized engineering designs: reduced design and engineering costs Volume purchasing program: NRECA’s National Discounts Program A series of pre-packaged business plans and financing options Tailored insurance package Reduced Engineering and other Soft Costs  Targeting a 25% reduction Extensive outreach and training

14 Co-ops Deploying Over 20MW of Solar PV $4.6M Project Over 4 Years

Feeder Import from Windmil™ or other tools

OMF — Sample Solar Simulation •









Partnership with PNNL, ORNL and the Grid Analytics Association. Increased solar capabilities are being added this year through a DOE-funded project. Overall goals are to allow utility planners to rapidly analyze the effects of PV on their systems, reducing time and cost needed to evaluate interconnection scenarios. Tool will also allow evaluation of various advanced control techniques available through IEEE 1547a, etc. Also looking at integration of forecasting into the OMF toolset.

The Essence Project • As more sophisticated electronics get integrated into the grid, cyber security becomes important at all levels. • However, most applications don’t “play nicely” with each other, making the CS task even more difficult. • NRECA is working with DOE and others to address these concerns.

Application Stack -- Grid of Today

Application Stack – The ESSENCE Layer

The ESSENCE Stack – Grid of the future ESSENCE Project

• DOE Funded • Managed by NRECA • Extended through Industry Participation • Reactive vs proactive cyber security • In hardware and software with machine learning • Common data layer to write “apps” on • Being extended to all industrial control

Integration of Advanced Power Electronics at Many Levels Many technologies are being developed which promise to change the way the grid is managed in the future.

May you Live in Interesting Times … Introducing the Fractal, Agile Grid 1883 1990

2025?

Control Through Angular Momentum

Analytically Driven Control Transition

Reliability through overbuilding

Lack of overall model Changing Technology Complicated Transition

Knowledge of state Precise control High performance analytics

Douglas Danley Technical Liaison to the Cooperative Research Network NRECA 4301 Wilson Blvd Arlington, VA 22203

[email protected]