Reactive Power Compensation for Parallel Inverters

without Control Interconnections in Microgrid

*


Xiaotian Zhang

, Hao Zhang

, Josep M. Guerrero

, Xikui Ma

Department of Electrical Engineering, Xian Jiaotong University, Xian, 710049, P. R. China

URT Renewal Energy Lab., EUETIB, Dept. ESAII, UPC, Barcelona, 08036, Spain
E-mail: haozhang@xjtu.edu.cn



*
Supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No.50607015), and Natural Science Foundation of Shaanxi Province, China (Grant
No. 2006E113)
Abstract-In this paper, a control technique is developed for
parallel inverters with no control interconnections in microgrid.
The proposed control technique, based on droop control method
and virtual impedance method, uses only locally measurable
feedback signals to make some of the parallel inverters supply
only reactive power equally for loads while the others share only
active power. Simulation results are provided to prove the
validity of this approach.

I. INTRODUCTION
The microgrid concept assumes a cluster of loads and
micro sources operating as a single controllable system that
provides both power and heat to its local area [1]. This
concept is very much applicable to renewable energy sources
and clean energy sources. In such systems, these sources are
distributed, and every ac unit should be able to operate in
parallel without control interconnections due to the long
distance between them. As a key technique of the wireless
control, the well-known droop control method is proposed to
obtain the good sharing of the parallel inverters for different
application situations [2]-[6]. The droop method makes the
parallel inverters share both active and reactive power, which
lead to reactive current transition and power consumption on
power lines for the far-away parallel inverters. If only few
inverters are used to supply the whole reactive current near
the loads, the remote inverters could supply active power only
so that the energy losses on power lines would be reduced.
The conventional reactive power compensation technique can
be applied to the concentrated systems on the condition that
the total reactive current of load can be detected. However, in
the distributed systems, this can not be easily detected
because loads are distributed. Moreover, the power rating of
one inverter is not high enough. Thus, it is very important for
the microgrid to utilize the local parallel inverters to
implement the local reactive power compensation.
In this paper, a control scheme is proposed for parallel
connected inverters using only local output current as
feedback variables with some of these inverters only
supplying total reactive power. The active (or reactive) power
can be well shared among the functional similar inverters. We
have performed simulation studies of four parallel connected
inverters (two for active power, the other two for reactive
power) to show the validity of this method. The method can
be used in more active power supply and more reactive power
compensation inverters parallel connected distributed power
supply systems.

II. SYSTEM STRUCTURE
Fig. 1 shows the power supply system with single phase
inverters and loads parallel connected to a common ac bus.
The loads are relatively centralized, while the active power
supply inverters are relatively distributed. All the inverters
should be operating with no interconnections because the
inverters are not close to each other. Reactive power supply
inverters nearby the loads are paralleled for compensation.
Since the total reactive current of loads can not be easily
detected, the conventional reactive power compensation
methods can not be applied so the inverters must use their
local output current as feedback variables for compensation.
Load3
nth Active power
Supply Inverter
Load2
Loadn
1st Reactive power
Supply Inverter
1st Active power
Supply Inverter
Load1
Z
actn
Z
act1
Z
react1
nth Reactive power
Supply Inverter
Z
reactn

Fig. 1. Single phase power supply system with parallel inverters and loads

The inverter with the proposed control method is shown in
Fig. 2. The capacitor voltage and capacitor current are sensed
as feedback variables. An output current feedback loop is
added to force the output impedance to be resistive or
inductive. In Fig.2, the droop control depending on the output
impedance [6] is used for sharing. If the inverters supply only
active power, the output impedance will be designed resistive.
As a result, the droop control scheme should be

*
E E nP = (1)
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Fig. 2. The control scheme of proposed single phase inverter

If the inverters supply only reactive power, the output
impedance will be designed inductive. As a result, the droop
control scheme should be

*
E E nQ = (2)
As is shown in Fig. 3, each inverter can be modeled by a
two-terminal Thevenin equivalent circuit of the form [5], [6]
( ) ( )
o ref o
v G s v Z s i = (3)
where ( ) G s is the voltage gain and ( ) Z s is the output
impedance.
( )
ref
G s v o
v
o
i ( ) Z s

Fig. 3. Thevenin equivalent circuit of the closed-loop system

With the parameters 170V
in
V = , 4V
trg
V = , 10
v
k = ,
10
i
k = , 0.00001s
v
T = , 0.00001s
i
T = , 0.018
vf
k = , 1
if
k = ,
1.2mH L = and 15F C = , the Bode plots of ( ) G s and ( ) Z s
are shown in Fig. 4 and Fig. 5, respectively.
-60
-40
-20
0
20
40
M
a
g
n
it
u
d
e

(
d
B
)
10
2
10
3
10
4
10
5
10
6
10
7
- 180
- 135
-90
-45
0
P
h
a
s
e

(
d
e
g
)
Bode Diagram
Frequency (rad/sec)
Fig. 4. Bode diagrams of the voltage gain

From Fig. 5, we can see that the output impedance is small
enough that a current feedback can fix the output impedance
to a virtual value.

*
( )
ref ref v o
v v Z s i = (4)
The detailed control scheme will be illustrated in the
following section.
- 200
- 150
- 100
-50
0
M
a
g
n
it
u
d
e

(
d
B
)
10
2
10
3
10
4
10
5
10
6
10
7
-90
0
90
180
270
P
h
a
s
e

(
d
e
g
)
Bode Diagram
Frequency (rad/sec)

Fig. 5. Bode diagrams of the output impedance

III. PROPOSED CONTROL TECHNIQUE
As an illustration, the system with two inverters and a
resistive-inductive load operating in parallel is shown in Fig.
6, where inverter 1 represents the inverters which only supply
active power, and inverter 2 represents the inverters which
only supply reactive power, Z represents the total impedance
of all the loads connected to the bus. Although this parallel
system includes only two inverters and one load, the
proposed control scheme can be used in more inverters and
more loads parallel connected systems as well.
1
E

2
E
1 1 1
S P jQ = +
o
V

1 o
I

2 o
I

Z
2 o
Z
1 o
Z

Fig. 6. Parallel operation of two inverters

Let the total loads impedance be Z R jX = + , and then
the output voltage
o
V

leads the output current

o
I

by . The
purpose of our control is to make inverter 1 supply active
power and inverter 2 supply reactive power, respectively.
Therefore, the target output current
*
1 o
I

and
*
2 o
I

of the two
inverters can be given schematically in Fig. 7.
o
V

o
I

1 o
I

2 o
I

*
1 o
I

*
2 o
I

Fig. 7. Diagram of the output phasors

The conventional reactive power compensation can be
implemented in terms of the known current or phase angle of
the load. However, in distributed power systems, these values
can not be easily detected (see Fig. 1). So, we will propose a
new way for reactive power compensation using only the
local output current of each inverter as feedback variables.
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Suppose that each inverter has the almost equal value of
o
v and
*
( )
ref
G s v , then

*
1 1 2 2
( )
ref o o o o o
G s v v Z i Z i = = (5)
So, if the virtual output impedance are programmed as
1 o
Z kX = ,
2 o
Z jkR = ,
1 o
I

would lead
2 o
I

by 90. And also,

1 2 2 1
/ / / cos / sin
o o o o
I I Z Z R X = = = (6)
then
1 o
I

and
2 o
I

would be the expected phasors

*
1 o
I

and
*
2 o
I

, respectively. It means that inverter 1 will only supply

active power and inverter 2 will only supply reactive power.
Since R jX + is unknown to each inverter,
1 o
Z and
2 o
Z
can not be fixed. The only components of
1 o
Z and
2 o
Z that
can be fixed are their phase angles. Namely,
1 o
Z is designed
resistive and
2 o
Z is designed inductive. Then
1 o
I

will lead
2 o
I

by 90, but the amplitude ratio

1 2
/
o o
I I can not be fixed
to cos / sin , as is shown in Fig. 7.
The most important thing to do in control is to adjust the
amplitude ratio
1 2
/
o o
I I close to cos / sin , though this
target value is unknown to each inverter. When
*
1 1 o o
I I < (see
Fig. 7),
1 o
I

leads
o
V

by
1
, and
1
sin 0 < . Besides,
*
2 2 o o
I I > ,
2 o
I

lags
o
V

by
2
, and
2
cos 0 > . The relationship of
1 2 2 1
/ /
o o o o
I I Z Z = indicates that
1 o
I can be raised by
decreasing
1 o
Z and
2 o
I can be reduced by increasing
2 o
Z ,
depending on the known
1
sin and
2
cos , respectively.
When
*
1 1 o o
I I > (not shown in Fig. 7),
1 o
I

lags
o
V

by
1

,
and
1
sin 0

> . Besides,
*
2 2 o o
I I < ,
2 o
I

leads
o
V

by
2

, and
2
cos 0

< . The relationship of
1 2 2 1
/ /
o o o o
I I Z Z = indicates
that
1 o
I can be reduced by increasing
1 o
Z and
2 o
I can be
raised by decreasing
2 o
Z , depending on the known
1
sin


and
2
cos

, respectively..
Finally, the control law can be written as (in s-domain)

1
1 0
2 2
1 1
2
2 0
2 2
2 2
( ) ( )
( ) ( )
i
o p
i
o p
k Q
Z s R N A k
s
P Q
k P s
Z s X N A k
s
P Q

= + +

+

= + +


+

(7)
In Eq. (7), R
0
and X
0
are the initial value we set for the
output impedance, which are much bigger than line
impedance. But these values can not be too big, considering
the output voltage regulation. k
p
and k
i
are the proportional
gain and integral gain of the controller, respectively. N(A) is
the describing function of a limiter which is added to limit the
maximum adjusting range of the virtual output impedance.
The output impedance Z
o
is programmed by adding an
output current feedback control loop. Substituting Eq. (4) to
Eq. (3), the Thevenin equivalent circuit can be expressed as
( )
*
( ) ( ) ( ) ( )
o ref v o
v G s v G s Z s Z s i = + (8)
The output impedance approximates to ( ) ( )
o v
Z G s Z s = ,
since ( ) ( )
v
G s Z s is designed much bigger than ( ) Z s ,
therefore ( ) Z s can be neglected.
In practice, there are more inverters in parallel than what
we have modeled. These inverters should share the loads
equally with no control interconnections. This can be
implemented based on the well known droop method [6],
which can be expressed as
1) Resistive output impedance (e.g.
1 o
Z )

*
1 1 1
*
1 1 1
mQ
E E nP
= +

(9)
2) Inductive output impedance (e.g.
2 o
Z )

*
2 2 2
*
2 2 2
mP
E E nQ
=

(10)
We should notice that in the proposed control system, if the
output impedance is resistive the inverter will supply only
active power (e.g.
1
0 Q = ). If the output impedance is
inductive the inverter will supply only reactive power (e.g.
2
0 P = ). As a result, the frequency droop control should be
removed and the droop control can be written as

*
*
, 0
, 90
o
o
E E nP Z
E E nQ Z
= =

= =

(11)

IV. SIMULATION RESULTS
The simulation results for four parallel connected inverters
are shown to illustrate the validity of the proposed control
scheme. Inverter 1 and 3 are expected to supply active power
equally, while inverter 2 and 4 are expected to supply reactive
power equally. Table 1 shows the parameters of the four
inverters. The parameters except the impedance on power line
of inverter 1 and 3 (inverter 2 and 4) are almost the same.
TABLE I
PARAMETERS OF FOUR INVERTERS
Parameters Inverter 1 (or 3) Inverter 2 (or 4)
Output Voltage 110 V 110 V
Line Frequency 50 Hz 50 Hz
*
E 2.8 V 2.8 V
Filter Cut-off Frequency 10 rad/s 10 rad/s
Voltage Droop coefficient 1e-5 V/W 1e-5 V/VAR
Power Rating 1000 VA 1000 VA
kp 0.02 0.02
ki 5 /s 5 /s
Impedance Adjusting Range -0.11~1.1 -j0.11~j1.1
Initial Output Impedance 0.165 j0.165
Line Impedance 0.13 (0.11) 0.014 (0.015)

The initial loads 10+j5 are supplied by the four inverters.
Another load of 5+j15 is suddenly connected to bus at 1.5
second. Since the inverter 1 and 3 are designed to supply
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active power and inverter 2 and 4 are designed to supply
reactive power, the reactive power of inverter 1 and 3, as well
as the active power of inverter 2 and 4, should be zero. This is
verified in Fig. 8.

Fig. 8. Output power of four parallel inverters when loads step change occurs

Fig. 9 shows the load voltage and output current of the four
inverters after loads step change occurs.

Fig. 9. Load voltage and output current of four parallel inverters after loads
step change occurs

It can be seen in Fig. 8 and Fig. 9 that inverter 1 and 3 only
supply active current equally, while inverter 2 and 4 only
supply reactive current equally.
The load 10+j6 is supplied by inverter 1 and 2 until
inverter 3 and 4 are connected to the common bus at 1.5
second. The power supplied by the four inverters is shown in
Fig. 10.

Fig. 10. Output power of four parallel inverters when inverter 3 and 4 are
suddenly connected to bus

The output voltage and current of the four inverters after
the sudden connection of inverter 3 and 4 to bus are shown in
Fig. 11.

Fig. 11. Load voltage and output current of four parallel inverters after the
sudden connection of inverter 3 and 4 to bus

It can be seen in Fig. 10 and Fig. 11 that after inverter 3
and 4 are connected to common bus, both the output active
power of inverter 1 and the output reactive power of inverter
2 drop to half of their initial values, as inverter 3 and inverter
4 can share half of active power and half of the reactive
power for load, respectively.

V. CONCLUSION
A novel control technique has been proposed for operating
single phase inverters in parallel with no control
interconnections. By using only locally measurable feedback
signals to adjust the output impedance, some inverters can
supply active power only, while the other inverters are only
for reactive power compensation. Moreover, the active power
supply inverters as well as reactive power supply inverters
can share their output current equally. Simulation results
prove the validity of this approach.

REFERENCES
[1] R. H. Lasseter, MicroGrids, in Proc. IEEE PES02 Winter Meeting,
2002, pp. 305-308.
[2] A. Tuladhar, H. Jin, T. Unger, and K. Mauch, Parallel operation of
single phase inverter modules with no control interconnections, in
Proc. IEEE APEC97, 1997, pp. 94100.
[3] U. Borup, F. Blaabjerg, and P. N. Enjeti, Sharing of nonlinear load in
parallel-connected three-phase converters, IEEE Trans. Ind. Appl., vol.
37, no. 6, pp. 18171823, Nov./Dec. 2001.
[4] J. M. Guerrero, L. Garca de Vicua, J. Matas, M. Castilla, and J. Miret,
A wireless controller to enhance dynamic performance of parallel
inverters in distributed generation systems, IEEE Trans. Power
Electron., vol. 19, no. 5, pp. 12051213, Sep. 2004.
[5] J. M. Guerrero, L. Garca de Vicua, J. Miret, J. Matas, J. Cruz,
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using wireless and average current-sharing controllers, in Proc. IEEE
PESC04, 2004, vol. 4, pp. 2482-2488.
[6] J. M. Guerrero, L. Garca de Vicua, J. Matas, M. Castilla, and J. Miret,
Output impedance design of parallel-connected UPS inverters with
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4, pp. 11261135, Aug. 2005.


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