Design Factors for Developing a University Campus Microgrid

Recent decentralization of electricity systems together with the decarbonization and several changing societal demands are giving rise to different application scenarios such as microgrids. A microgrid is a small-scale electrical system which consists of several loads and sources (conventional and renewables) that can either operate autonomously in a stand-alone mode or interconnected with the main grid. The design and development of such a smart microgrid in a university campus is proposed within the 3DMicroGrid project (funded through the ERANETMED European Union’s initiative). This paper reviews the main components and characteristics of similar microgrids developed around the world. Furthermore, this study provides the design guidelines, the main functionalities, the key components and the control architecture for developing the microgrid proposed by the 3DMicroGrid project. A simulation model has been developed and initial results are demonstrated for the operation of this microgrid. The recommendations and insights are replicable to any solar priority country for future microgrids pilots.This work is supported by the Cyprus Research Promotion Foundation (RPF, Cyprus, Project ΚΟΙΝΑ/ERANETMED/ 1114), the Malta Council for Science and Technology (MCST), the Spain Ministerio de Economía, Industria y Competitividad (MINECO), the Jordan Higher Council for Science and Technology (HCST), the General Secretariat for Research and Technology of Greece (GSRT), the Scientific and Technological Research Council of Turkey (TUBITAK) and the Algeria General Direction of Scientific Research and Technological Development (DGRSDT) through the ERANETMED initiative of Member States, Associated Countries and Mediterranean Partner Countries (3DMgrid Project ID eranetmed_energy-11-286). © 2017 IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works, for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted component of this work in other works. L. Hadjidemetriou, L. Zacharia, E. Kyriakides, B. Azzopardi, S. Azzopardi, R. Mikalauskiene, S. Al-Agtash, M. Al-hashem, A. Tsolakis, D. Ioannidis, D. Tzovaras, "Design factors for developing a university campus microgrid," in Proc. IEEE ENERGYCON2018, Limassol, Cyprus, 2018, pp. 1-6. https://www.ieee.org/publications_standards/publications/rights/rights_policies.htm