Asymmetrical Fault Current Calculation Method and Influencing Factors Analysis of Droop-Controlled Inverters

Since the fault dynamic of droop-controlled inverter is different from synchronous generators (SGs), protection devices may become invalid, and the fault overcurrent may damage power electronic devices and threaten the safety of the microgrid. Therefore, it is imperative to conduct a comprehensive fault analysis of the inverter to guide the design of protection schemes. However, due to the complexity of droop control strategy, existing literatures have simplified asymmetric fault analysis of droop-controlled inverters to varying degrees. Therefore, accurate fault analysis of a droop-controlled inverter is needed. In this paper, by analyzing the control system, an accurate fault model is established. Based on this, a calculation method for instantaneous asymmetrical fault current is proposed. In addition, the current components and current characteristics are analyzed. It was determined that fault currents are affected by control loops, fault types, fault distance and nonlinear limiters. In particular, the influences of limiters on the fault model, fault current calculation and fault current characteristics were analyzed. Through detailed analysis, it was found that dynamics of the control loop cannot be ignored, the fault type and fault distance determine fault current level, and part of the limiters will totally change the fault current trend. Finally, calculation and experimental results verify the correctness of the proposed method.

Solid-state Circuit Breaker Based on Cascaded Normally-on SiC JFETs for Medium-voltage DC Distribution Networks

Solid-state circuit breakers(SSCBs)are critical components in the protection of medium-voltage DC distribution networks to facilitate arc-free,fast and reliable isolation of DC faults.However,limited by the capacity of a single semiconductor device,using semi-conductor-based SSCBs at high voltage is challenging.This study presents the details of a 1.5 kV,63 A medi-um-voltage SSCB,composed primarily of a solid-state switch based on three cascaded normally-on silicon car-bide(SiC)junction field-effect transistors(JFETs)and a low-cost programmable gate drive circuit.Dynamic and static voltage sharing among the cascaded SiC JFETs of the SSCB during fault isolation is realized using the pro-posed gate drive circuit.The selection conditions for the key parameters of the SSCB gate driver are also analyzed.Additionally,an improved pulse-width modulation cur-rent-limiting protection solution is proposed to identify the permanent overcurrent and transient inrush current associated with capacitive load startup in a DC distribu-tion network.Using the developed SSCB prototype and the fault test system,experimental results are obtained to validate the fault response performance of the SSCB.Index Terms—Solid-state circuit breaker,DC distribu-tion network,SiC JFET,voltage balancing,inrush current.

Stability Investigation and Improvement for DC Cascade Systems with Simplified Impedance-based Stability Criterion

In DC distributed power systems(DPSs),the complex impedance interactions possibly lead to DC bus voltage oscillation or collapse.In previous research,the stability analysis of DPSs is implemented based on mathematical analysis in control theory.The specific mechanisms of the instability of the cascade system have not been intuitively clarified.In this paper,the stability analysis of DPSs based on the traditional Nyquist criterion is simplified to the resonance analysis of the seriesconnected port impedance(Z=R+jX)of source and load converters.It reveals that the essential reason for impedance instability of a DC cascade system is that the negative damping characteristic(R<0)of the port the overall impedance amplifies the internal resonance source at reactance zero-crossing frequency.The simplified stability criterion for DC cascade systems can be concluded as:in the negative damping frequency ranges(R<0),there exists no zero-crossing point of the reactance component(i.e.,X=0).According to the proposed stability criterion,the oscillation modes of cascade systems are classified.A typical one is the internal impedance instability excited by the negative damping,and the other one is that the external disturbance amplified by negativity in a low stability margin.Thus,the impedance reshaping method for stability improvement of the system can be further specified.The validity of the simplified criterion is verified theoretically and experimentally by a positive damping reshaping method.

SiC JFETs Modular Cascaded Method with Active Clamp Control Strategy for DC Solid-state Circuit Breaker

Power semiconductor devices cascaded topology is one of the most common solutions for solid-state circuit breakers(SSCBs)working in medium-voltage DC systems.However,when the number of cascaded devices is large,current series technologies of power semiconductor devices will be difficult to be applied since with uneven voltage sharing problems.Thus,this paper proposes a novel cascade method of multi-SiC JFETs based on modules cascaded.This method consists of two parts:one is a single-gate driver cascaded SiC JFETs topology which is used to form the module,the other one is an active clamp control strategy which ensures that each module is protected from overvoltage when modules are cascaded.The proposed cascade method can effectively suppress voltage overshoot of cascading power devices in the switching process.Based on the proposed cascade method,a 5kV/63A SSCB prototype is designed.Finally,an experiment is conducted based on the designed SSCB.Experimental results validate the effectiveness of the proposed cascaded method for SSCB.

Droop control method for load share and voltage regulation in high-voltage microgrids

When the line impedance is considered in the microgrid, the accuracy of load sharing will decrease. In this paper, the impact of line impedance on the accuracy of load sharing is analyzed. A robust droop control for a highvoltage microgrid is proposed based on the signal detection on the high-voltage side of the coupling transformer. For a high-voltage microgrid, the equivalent impedance of coupling transformer connecting distributed generator with the grid is usually the dominate factor. Compared with the conventional droop control strategy, the proposed control method in this paper detects the feedback signal from the high-voltage side of the coupling transformer. The impact of line impedance on the load sharing accuracy can be mitigated significantly. The proposed droop control only changes the detection point of the feedback signal, thus it is easy to be implemented. The PSCAD/EMTDC simulation results show the effectiveness of the proposed robust droop control concept in load sharing and voltage regulation with highly accuracy.