Virtual Oscillator Controller Optimisation Using Low-Bandwidth Communication

Power systems around the world continue to change with the increasing adoption of distributed generation in the form of renewable energy technologies. The increasing penetrations of intermittent renewable energy technologies necessitates improvements in power sharing control, with microgrids being a popular arrangement for large numbers of distributed energy sources. In recent years a new method for autonomously sharing power has been researched known as virtual oscillator control (VOC). Autonomous/Wireless power-sharing methods are however susceptible to steady state power sharing error due to heterogeneous network impedances. This paper presents a novel low-bandwidth secondary controller that adjusts the set-points of the virtual oscillator controller to mitigate power-sharing error caused by heterogeneous network impedances. The virtual oscillator controller is shown to exceed the performance of the droop controller during transient events, however a small inherent power coupling is demonstrated in the virtual oscillator system with heterogeneous network resistances.