Adaptive Protection Scheme for Microgrid

The environmental issues receive more attention by the day, which results in a greater interest in renewable energy sources and ways of making the delivery and usage of energy more efficient. One solution that has emerged is microgrids, selfsufficient electrical grids containing renewable energy sources and loads. A microgrid can either operate on its own or as a part of larger grid, depending on energy availability. The aim of this project was to develop a protection algorithm and deploy it on a cheap microcontroller. The protection algorithm should ensure that faults occurring in the microgrid were detected and handled, in both operating modes. A model of a microgrid in both operating modes was created. The protection algorithm was applied to the model in a real time simulator to verify that the algorithm took action against faults. By introducing faults to the circuit, we could demonstrate that the algorithm performed as expected. We concluded that it is possible to deploy a basic adaptive protection scheme on a cheap microcontroller. Also, that a flawless protection scheme for a microgrid is of high value if the use of microgrids will continue to grow