A Review on Mode Transition Strategies between Grid-Connected and Standalone Operation of Voltage Source Inverters-Based Microgrids

Abstract

Microgrids technologies are seen as a cost effective and reliable solution to handle numerous challenges, mainly related to climate change and power demand increase. This is mainly due to their potential for integrating available on-site renewable energy sources and their flexibility and scalability. The particularity of microgrids is related to their capacity to operate in synchronization with the main grid or in islanded mode to secure the power supply of nearby end-users after a grid failure thanks to storage solutions and an intelligent control system. The most critical operating case occurs when a sudden transition from grid-connected (GC) to stand-alone operation (SA) happens. During the transition, the system experiences abrupt changes that can result in a malfunction of the control system and a possible failure of the power system. The transition issue attracted considerable attention from researchers. Indeed, many research works are proposed to address this issue by proposing detection and transition techniques that ensure a smooth transition at the islanding time. Although there are several approaches to dealing with this issue, a categorization of the proposed methods in the literature and their differences is useful to assist engineers and researchers working on this topic. Thus, this study proposes a comprehensive review to summarize these approaches and point out their advantages and limitations.

Keywords

• microgrids
• distributed generation systems
• voltage source inverters
• islanding
• mode transition control
• seamless transition