Open Access

ARTICLE

Integrated Equipment with Functions of Current Flow Control and Fault Isolation for Multiterminal DC Grids

Shuo Zhang^1,2, Guibin Zou^1,*
1 School of Electrical Engineering, Shandong University, Jinan, 250061, China
2 Suzhou Research Institute, Shandong University, Suzhou, 215123, China
* Corresponding Author: Guibin Zou. Email:
(This article belongs to the Special Issue: Emerging Technologies for Future Smart Grids)

Energy Engineering https://doi.org/10.32604/ee.2024.057452

Received 18 August 2024; Accepted 25 September 2024; Published online 16 October 2024

Abstract

The multi-terminal direct current (DC) grid has extinctive superiorities over the traditional alternating current system in integrating large-scale renewable energy. Both the DC circuit breaker (DCCB) and the current flow controller (CFC) are demanded to ensure the multiterminal DC grid to operates reliably and flexibly. However, since the CFC and the DCCB are all based on fully controlled semiconductor switches (e.g., insulated gate bipolar transistor, integrated gate commutated thyristor, etc.), their separation configuration in the multiterminal DC grid will lead to unaffordable implementation costs and conduction power losses. To solve these problems, integrated equipment with both current flow control and fault isolation abilities is proposed, which shares the expensive and duplicated components of CFCs and DCCBs among adjacent lines. In addition, the complicated coordination control of CFCs and DCCBs can be avoided by adopting the integrated equipment in the multiterminal DC grid. In order to examine the current flow control and fault isolation abilities of the integrated equipment, the simulation model of a specific meshed four-terminal DC grid is constructed in the PSCAD/EMTDC software. Finally, the comparison between the integrated equipment and the separate solution is presented a specific result or conclusion needs to be added to the abstract.

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Keywords

Integrated equipment; multiterminal direct current grid; current flow control; fault isolation

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