A Distributed Generation Manager with support for Distributed Network Operator Commands

The distributed generation management (DGM) is becoming mandatory to allow the distributed network operator (DNO) deal with several issues in the grid with distributed generation units. In this work a solution is proposed for the management of multiple photovoltaic inverters inside a microgrid. This paper proposes a supervisory unit for the DGM in order to deal with several conditions of inverters operation inside grid. A secure communication system using IEC 61850/SunSpec protocols is applied such that the DNO can effectively command the microgrid inverters as a single unit of dispatch. Moreover, in the proposed approach all inverters are optimized to work in different dispatch modes: MPPT, limited active power mode, power factor correction mode and reactive power dispatch. The proposed system architecture, the distributed generation manager as well as the Supervisory Unit are detailed. The paper presents the results from simulations and from the Raspberry Pi 3 hardware implementation with real-time dSPACE based microgrid emulator.