1
Modeling, Control and Testing of a
Voltage-Source-Inverter-Based Microgrid
Liping Su
Key Laboratory of Control of Power Transmission and Conversio
n, Ministry of Education
Shanghai Jiaotong University
Shanghai, China
Abstract Microgrids are low-voltage distribution networks
comprising various distributed generators (DGs), storage devices,
and controllable loads that can operate either interconnected or
isolated from the main distribution grid as a controlled entity. This
paper concentrates on the modeling and control of a
voltage-source-inverter-based microgrid. Considering the
dispersion of DGs and loads, the controllers are designed using
different control strategies respectively corresponding to the types
of the DGs and ways of combining of storage devices. The Power
and Voltage Controller coupled with the microsources provides fast
response to disturbances and load changes without relying on
communications. PQ control can realize the designated control of
real and reactive power of DGs according to actual operation
situation. V/f control can realize power sharing between different
DGs when the load power changes, and provide frequency support
when in the islanded mode. With the implementation of the unified
controller, the inverter-based microgrid system is able to switch
between islanding and grid-connected modes without disrupting
connected critical loads. The two control strategies have been
verified in simulation using MATLAB/SIMULINK by switching
between interconnected and islanded modes.
Keywords-distributed generation (DG); mircogrid; V/f control;
PQ control; inverter
I. INTRODUCTION
The penetration of distributed generation at medium and low
voltages (MV and LV), both in utility networks and downstream
of meters, is increasing worldwide. The presence of generation
close to demand can reduce carbon emissions, increase the
power quality and reliability (PQR) of electricity delivered to
sensitive loads, potentially reduce the need for traditional system
expansion and so on. But controlling a potentially huge number
of DGs creates a daunting new challenge for operating and
controlling the network safely and efficiently [1]. This challenge
can be partially addressed by microgrids. The Consortium for
Electric Reliability Technology Solutions (CERTS) Microgrid
concept assumes an aggregation of loads and microsources
operating as a single system providing both power and heat.
Microgrids are low-voltage distribution networks comprising
various distributed generators (DGs), storage devices, and
This work was supported by the Science Project from the Science and
Technology Commission of Shanghai Municipality, China.
978-1-4577-0365-2/11/$26.00 2011 IEEE
Guojie Li, Zhijian Jin
Key Laboratory of Control of Power Transmission and
Conversion, Ministry of Education
Shanghai Jiaotong University
Shanghai,China
controllable loads that can operate either interconnected or
isolated from the main distribution grid as a controlled entity.
Many forms of DGs such as fuel-cells, photo-voltaic and
micro-turbines are interfaced to the network through power
electronic converters. These interface devices make the sources
more flexible in their operation and control compared to the
conventional electrical machines. However, due to their
negligible physical inertia they also make the system potentially
susceptible to oscillations resulting from network disturbances
[1] [2]. So Microgrid control is critical, which needs to ensure
that: new microsources can be added to the system without
modification of existing equipment, the Microgrid can connect
to or isolate itself from the grid in a rapid and seamless fashion,
reactive and active power can be independently controlled,
voltage sag and system imbalances can be corrected, and that the
Microgrid can meet the grids load dynamics requirements [2].
In this paper, a systematic approach to modeling an
inverter-based microgrid is presented. Considering the
dispersion of the DGs and loads, the controllers are designed
using different control strategies including V/f control and PQ
control respectively corresponding to the types of the DGs and
ways of combining of storage devices. The performance of the
proposed controller has been tested extensively in simulation
using MATLAB/SIMULINK and verified the accuracy of the
two control strategies.
II. MICROGRID MODELING
A multi-bus microgrid configuration system considered in
this paper is shown in Fig. 1, where two paralleled DG systems
1 and 2 are employed. Each DG system is comprised of a dc
source, a pulse-width modulation (PWM) voltage source
inverter (VSI) and LC filters used to filter out the high frequency
harmonics. Sensitive loads 1 and 2 access bus 2 and bus 3
respectively, while variable load 3 access bus1. Then the
microgrid which consists of two DGs and three loads connects
to the distribution network through switches and a transformer.
A typical characteristic of a microgrid is that it can be
operated either in grid connected or islanded mode. Under
normal mode of operation, the microgrid is connected to the
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utility system at the point of common coupling (PCC). In this iL is the output current of inverter, iLd and iLq are currents
mode, the two DG systems both adopt PQ control to provide
local power and voltage support for critical loads 1 and 2. This of d axis and q axis of iL by dq transformation, respectively.
configuration reduces the burden of generation and delivery of Assuming that the output active power and reactive power of
power directly from the utility grid and enhances the immunity
of critical loads to system disturbances in the utility grid. When inverter are Pref and Qref , respectively, and due to
disturbances such as faults occur, the microgrid turns to the
islanded mode [3]. In this mode, the two DGs are the sole power unq 0 (1)
sources left to regulate the load voltage and supply uninterrupted Then
power to critical loads. At this time, DG2 is the master DG and
DG1 is the affiliated DG. The control of DG2 turns to V/f
control to provide voltage and frequency reference. After Pref
islanding, the reconnection of the microgrid is achieved
iLdref
und
autonomously after the tripping event is no longer present.
Qref (2)
iLqref
und
The above two equations represent the P&Q Control module
in Fig. 2 and show that there are an external power control and
inner current control [6]. The tracking of the reference active
power Pref and reactive power Qref is to track the reference
current iLref . P is determined by iLd and Q is determined by iLq .
Thus, control of P and Q is decoupled.

Fig.1 Microgrid modeling

III. CONTROLLER DESIGN

This section presents the two basic control strategies
respectively corresponding to the type of the DG. The DGs such
as photovoltaic generation (PV) and wind turbines use PQ
control strategy due to its output power influenced by the
weather [4]. And the DGs such as microturbines and fuel cells,
whose output power is easy to be controlled, so both PQ and V/f
control strategies are suitable for them. It should be noted that
the proposed controller illustrated in a simplified two-DG
Fig.2 PQ control schematic
system in this study can be expanded to be used in a more
complex microgrid with more DG systems. B. V/f Control
A. PQ Control Fig. 3 is the V/f control schematic; Fig. 4 is the power
Fig. 2 is the PQ control schematic for the three-phase control module; Fig. 5 is the two feedback loop control of
grid-interfacing inverter. voltage and current.
If the DG needs inverter to connect to the conventional In Fig. 4, the P and Q calculation blocks that calculate the
distribution system and the capacity of power and energy storage values of active and reactive power will use the knowledge of
device is enough, each feeder in Fig. 1 can be equivalent to the instantaneous values of d axis and q axis voltages and currents.
part above the dashed line of Fig. 2 [5]. The equations used are:

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P und id unq iq
(3)
Q unq id und iq
The droop control block includes Q verse V Droop and P
verse f Droop. They can be expressed in the following
equations [7]:

Pn P
f f n Fig.4 Power control schematic
m
(4)
V V Q
0
n
The parameters m and n can be obtained by the followings:
Pmax Pn
m f f
n min
(5)
Fig.5 Voltage and current control loop
n Qmax
V0 Vmin In Fig. 5, the external voltage control loop uses PI controller
The reference frequency and amplitude of the output voltage can to stabilize the system and the inner current control loop uses
be obtained by droop control, and then the symmetric proportion controller to improve the system dynamic response.
As shown, outer capacitor voltage feedback compensator
three-phase reference voltage uref can be obtained by f and V
wC f u nref is used to force the capacitor voltages to track their
through voltage synthesis controller, then udref and uqref are
sinusoidal reference waveforms stiffly with an acceptable low
obtained by dq transformation as the inputs of Fig. 5 [8]. output total harmonic distortion (THD) [4].
IV. SIMULATION VERIFICATION OF MODEL
In this paper, the whole system control method is called
master-slave operation, which means that one DG acts as the
master and the others as affiliates. When in grid-connected mode
all DGs adopt PQ control and when in islanded mode the master
DG turns to V/f control to provide voltage and frequency
reference to the other DGs. In this paper, DG2 is the master DG
and DG1is the affiliated one.
The performance of the proposed controller is tested in
MATLAB/SIMULINK using the system parameters shown in
Table I.

TABLE I SYSTEM PARAMETERS

Parameters Values

DC voltage vdc 800V

Inverter filter resistance Rf 0.01
Inverter filter inductance Lf 0.6 103 H
Fig.3 V/f control schematic DG1
Inverter filter capacitance C f 1.5 103 F
Inverter switching frequency f s 8 103 Hz
Reference active power Pn 8kW
Reference reactive power Qn 0kW

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DG2
Same as DG1, except Pn 20kW transition from grid-connected to islanding mode at t=0.5s is
shown in Figs. 6~9, respectively. When disconnected from
fn 50Hz distribution network, the output active power of DG2 increases,
which means the master DG need to output more active power
PQ Controller
v0 380V for power balance. At the same time, the output active power of
k 0.00125 DG1 is unchanged because of PQ control. Fig. 7shows that the
output reactive power of DG2 decreases whose value is
kvp 0.5 equivalent to the one distribution network output to the
microgrid before disconnection. And the output reactive power
kvi 20 of DG1 is zero because its power factor is 1. The voltage of
1/m BUS2 increases because the output reactive power of DG1
1105
1/n decreases. Fig.9 shows that the frequency decreases within
V/f Controller
3 104 permitted range when disconnected from distribution network
k 1 and it verifies that the V/f control can provide stable frequency
support.
kvp 10
kvi 2000
R1n 0.347 / km
The line of 10kV
X 1n 0.234 / km
R2 n 0.641 / km
The line of 380V
X 2 n 0.101 / km
Load 1
R1 5, X1 0.628
Load 2
R2 5, X 2 0.628
Load 3
R3 10, X 3 1.57 Fig.6 The output active power of DG1 and DG2
Rating capacity
300kVA
Rating voltage
Transformer 0.4kV /10kV
Zk* 4%
pk 4.26kW
Distribution network
10kV
The action set is shown in Table II. Before 0.5s, the system is
in grid-connected mode and the two DGs both adopt PQ control.
DG2 turns to V/f control when the microgrid transits from
grid-connected to islanding mode at t=0.5s.

TABLE II ACTION SET Fig.7 The output reactive power of DG1 and DG2
Time Action Status
0s~0.5s DG2 PQ In grid-connected
0.5s K open
DG2 V/f
0.5s~2s In islanded
1s K3 open Shedding load 3
1.5s K3 close Adding load 3
2s K close In grid-connected
DG2 PQ

A. Transition from Grid-Connected to Islanding Mode

Response of the output active and reactive power of DG1 Fig.8 The voltage of BUS2
and DG2, the BUS2voltage, and the system frequency during

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Fig.9 The frequency of system

Fig.12 The voltage of BUS2
B. In Islanding Mode, Switching Load 3
Response of the output active and reactive power of DG1
and DG2, the BUS2voltage, and the system frequency when
shedding load 3 at t=1.0s and adding load 3 at t=1.5s in
islanding mode is shown in Figs. 10~13, respectively. Figs. 10
and 11show that in islanding mode, the change of power by
switching load 3 is tracked by the master DG2.The output active
and reactive power of DG2 decrease when shedding load 3 and
increase when adding load 3. At the same time, the output active
and reactive power of DG1 keep unchanged during switching
load 3. The results show that V/f control can track load
Fig.13 The frequency of system
interruption perfectly and PQ control can provide stable output
power. Fig.12 shows that the voltage of sensitive load1is stable.
C. Transition from Islanding to Grid-Connected Mode
Fig.13 shows that the change of frequency reflects the change of
active power of DG2 and by V/f control it can be maintained Response of the output active and reactive power of DG1
within permitted range. and DG2, the BUS2 voltage, and the system frequency during
transition from islanding mode to grid-connected at t=2s is
shown in Figs. 14~17, respectively. The output active power of
DG1 remains unchanged and that of DG2 decreases when
microgrid reconnects to distribution network that outputs active
power to microgrid. The output reactive power of DG1 remains
zero and that of DG2 also increases to zero because of turning to
PQ control. The BUS2 voltage has been affected a little bit due
to the decrease of reactive power from DG2. Fig.17 shows that
the system frequency has been affected during operation mode
change but the variation is quite small within permitted range.

Fig.10 The output active power of DG1 and DG2

Fig.14 The output active power of DG1 and DG2

Fig.11 The output reactive power of DG1 and DG2

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grid-connected and islanded modes, and during operation mode

Fig.15 The output reactive power of DG1 and DG2
Fig.16 The voltage of BUS2
transitions.
VI. REFERENCES
[1] N. Hatziargyriou, H. Asano, R. Iravani and C. Marnay, Microgrids, IEEE
power & energy magi, July/august 2007, 1540-7977.
[2] R. Lassetter, Control Methods for MicroGrids: The CERTS Microgrid
Concept, CERT Rep., Apr.2002
[3] N. M. Abdel-Rahim and J. E. Quiche, Analysis and design of a multiple
feedback loop control strategy for single-phase voltage-source UPS
inverters, IEEE Trans. Power Electron, vol. PE-11, pp. 532-541, July
1996.
[4] Esmaili, Xul, Nicholsn D K, A new control method of permanent magnet
generator for maximum power tracking in wind turbine application,
Proceedings of Power Engineering Society General Meeting, vol. 3, Jun
12-16, 2005, San Francisco, CA, USA: 2090-2095
[5] M. N. Marwari and A. Keyhani, Control of distributed generation
system-Part I: voltage and current control, IEEE Trans. Power Electric,
vol. 19, no. 6, pp. 1541-1550, Nov. 2004.
[6] M. Radanovich, T. Green, and H. Mansur, A survey of control methods
for parallel three-phase inverters connection, Proc. Inst. Elect. Eng., no.
475, pp. 472-477, Sep.2000.
[7] C. S. Wang, Synthetical Control and Analysis of Microgrid, Automation
of Electric Power Systems, vol. 32, no. 7, Apr. 10, 2008.
[8] W. J. Yang, Simulation and Research of Grid Connected Photovoltaic
Generation and Microgrid Operation Control, M. D. thesis, Sichuan,
Southwest Jiao Tong University, 2010(in Chinese).

Fig.17 The frequency of system

V. CONCLUSIONS
In this paper, a three-bus microgrid is presented, which
includes microsources, inverters and loads. The control of
inverters is critical because the control flexibility allows the
microgrid to present itself to the bulk power system as a single
controlled unit, have plug-and-play simplicity for each
microsource, and meet the customers local needs.
This paper presents two control strategies for the microgrid,
PQ control and V/f control respectively. The PQ control is
suitable for the DGs whose output power is adjustable and the
V/f control is suitable for the DGs whose output power is stable.
The PQ control makes the DGs output the reference power
according to the actual situation and the V/f control makes the
DGs share of power between the DG systems when the
microgrid islands from the utility and provide frequency support
when the microgrid is in islanded mode.
The simulation by MATLAB/SIMULINK confirmed the
effectiveness and robustness of the two control strategies in

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