System level parameter tuning of an islanded microgrid with improved computational efficiency

This paper primarily deals with improving the computational efficiency of the continuation small signal stability analysis of a microgrid. The continuation (or iterative) small signal stability analysis is required to carry out control parameter tuning based upon the system level study. In specific, tuning of droop coefficients and current feed-forward loop gains of voltage controllers in an islanded microgrid is addressed. A generalized system configuration with non-identical sources and arbitrary load placements is considered. The construction of the system state matrix for such generalized configuration is explained. Similarly to the existing approaches, the continuation small signal stability analysis is performed through exhaustive enumerations. However, the system state matrix is initially decomposed into components in the form of the coefficients of parameters to be tuned. Therefore, there is no need to entirely reconstruct the system matrix at each iteration. The computation time requirement can be further reduced by deploying the sparsity of each matrix component. A clear rule is also established for the tuning of multiple parameters. The effectiveness of the methodology proposed is verified through a detailed case study