Microgrid Control Laboratory

Location

IR Building, RM 154
University of Central Florida
4000 Central Florida Blvd.
Orlando, Florida 32816

Lab Director

  • Dr. Zhihua Qu

Faculty Members

  • Dr. Aleks Dimitrovski
  • Dr. Qifeng Li
  • Dr. Junjian Qi
  • Dr. Zhihua Qu
  • Dr. Wei Sun
  • Dr. Qun Zhou
Siemens Lab

Mission

The lab aims at safe, reliable, efficient and secure operation of large-scale distribution networks with extremely high penetration of renewables. Local communication and automatic clustering are used to enable self-organizing microgrids. Distributed optimization and control algorithms are used to autonomously coordinate intermittent renewables and other distributed energy resources, to maintain voltage stability, to minimize energy loss, and to optimize demand responses and storage. Through collaborating with industry/utility partners, real-world data are used to validate designs, and hardware-in-the-loop (HIL) simulations are conducted. Students can also test their algorithms using a bench-top setup.
Siemens Lab

Laboratory Facility

The lab provides capabilities of both software modeling and hardware-in-the-loop testing for microgrid modeling and control. In addition to standard software (PSS/E, DIgSILENT, ETAP, EMTP, DSATools, CPLEX), the lab is equipped with a multi-agent OpenDSS platform (MA-OpenDSS). As shown in the middle diagram below, the lab contains OPAL-RT hardware (eMEGAsim, ePHASORsim, RT-Lab, IRIG/GPS Synchronization reference board, Driver IEC61850 GOOSE for protection relay interface), SEL relays (SEL-411L Advanced Line Differential Protection, Automation, and Control System), SEL-3373 Station Phasor Data Concentrator, SEL-2488 Satellite-Synchronized Network Clock, and SEL-2730M Managed Ethernet Switch. In addition, there is also an inverter-based bench-top microgrid demonstration setup (see the photo on top).