2014 5th IEEE PES Innovative Smart Grid Technologies Europe (ISGT Europe), October 12-15, Istanbul
Control Strategy and Application of Power Converter
System in Battery Energy Storage System
Zheng Tianwen, Chen Laijun, Mei Shengwei
State Key Laboratory of Power System, Department of Electrical Engineering
Tsinghua University
Beijing, China
tianwenscu@163.com
Abstract—The power converter system (PCS) plays an
important role in the battery energy storage system (BESS).
Based on the traditional bi-directional converter topologies, a
control strategy for the PCS is proposed and integrated in an
industrial oriented device to meet the requirements of BESS in
both stand-alone and grid-connected mode. The control strategy
consists of VF control in stand-alone mode and PQ control in
grid-connected mode. Then, the design of the PCS controller is
illustrated in detail in term of hardware and software. Further,
the field performance of a 50kW PCS utilized in a practical
project demonstrates the effectiveness of the control strategy.
Index Terms-- BESS; PCS; stand-alone mode; grid-connected
mode
I. INTRODUCTION
With increasing concerns over environment deterioration
and energy consumption, more and more renewable energy
sources are integrated into power systems in the form of
microgrid. The battery energy storage system (BESS) plays
an important role in smoothing the intermittent fluctuating
output power of the microgrid. Meanwhile, BESS is widely
adopted to achieve power interaction between the microgrid
and the distribution power system [1]-[3].
In general, BESS is mainly composed of batteries and the
power converter system (PCS). Therein, PCS is a bi-directed
AC-DC converter, which is the key factor of BESS to meet
the variable operation demands [4]-[6].
Traditionally, PCS mainly operates in grid connected mode
to make full use of the characteristics of charging and
discharging. However, with the development of microgrid,
PCS needs to operate in both grid-connected mode and stand-
alone mode for dual-mode operation of BESS and microgrid.
When operating in stand-alone mode, PCS is isolated from
the power grid to provide stable voltage and frequency for the
islanded microgrid. Otherwise, PCS should be connected to
grid to transmit power flow when working at grid-connected
mode. Therefore, the strategies and operating modes utilized
This work is supported by the National High Technology Research and
Development of China 863 Program (2012AA050204), and the Foundation
for Innovative Research Groups of the National Natural Science Foundation
of China (51321005)
978-1-4799-7720-8/14/$31.00 ©2014 IEEE
in PCS have important effects on the characteristics and
functions of BESS and even microgrid.
An operation scheme of grid-connected converter is
proposed to achieve bi-directional power exchange between
the battery energy storage system and power grid in Ref. [7].
A high efficiency grid-tie BESS is designed in Ref. [8], in
which the proposed PCS works as the interface between the
battery pack and the ac grid, and this reference mainly
focuses on the efficiency of BESS with battery energy
management.
A new closed-loop control strategy for three-phase
constant-voltage and constant-frequency inverter is
investigated in Ref. [9], which provides a new concept for
PCS control in stand-alone operation mode. Ref. [10]
introduced a new type of PCS topology utilizing a cascaded
multilevel inverter, which can meet the requirements of
charging and discharging, and can provide power supply for
critical loads when the grid is out of service. However, the
structure of PCS is too complex to be applied.
In summary, most of the work above pays great attention to
grid-connected operation mode and isolated operation mode
of PCS separately. However, it is difficult to integrate the two
operation modes in a PCS with effective and practical
strategy. In this paper, an industrial oriented PCS is built up
and integrated with control strategy for both stand-alone and
grid-connected modes.
The rest of the paper is organized as follows. The basic
topology of PCS is introduced in Section II. The control
strategy in stand-alone operation mode and grid-connected
operation mode is proposed in Section III. Section IV
illustrates the hardware and software design details of the
PCS controller. Section V presents the experiment results and
analysis in different operation conditions. Conclusions are
drawn in Section V.
 2

II. PCS TOPOLOGY

To meet the operation demands, the proposed PCS
va vb vc vdref
varef vd + vdr
topology is designed as follows:
abc  PI Magnitude
v
vbref T and phase SVPWM
udc idc PCS vcref
PLL To
dq
vq vqr angle Tc generator PWM
 PI calculation pulse
sa sb sc ia ua L ea iga va B1 +
LT1:K vqref
C0
ib ub eb igb vb
Battery Y Grid
ic uc ec igc vc
sac sbc scc T Figure 2. VF control structure diagram
C In Figure 2, varef, vbref and vcref denote the reference of
information sampling PWM sampling
R sampling three-phase output voltage of PCS, which include voltage
pusle
acquistion magnitude and frequency. vd and vq represent the d axis and q
axis component of the measured three phase voltage (va, vb
comprehensive controller
and vc) through dq coordinate transform, respectively. vdref
Figure1. PCS topology and vqref are the d axis and q axis component of the reference
voltage (varef, vbref and vcref), respectively.
In Figure 1, batteries with high energy density are utilized
to provide a stable DC voltage. The DC capacitor (C0) is As shown in Figure 2, the proposed VF control is mainly
adopted mainly to suppress the harmonics to the DC voltage. based on coordinate transform and PI regulation together with
The AC transformer (T) is connected in the form of /Yn, magnitude and phase angle calculation and space vector pulse
which has the function of electrical isolation, voltage matching width modulation (SVPWM).
and AC filtering. The grid-connected switch (B1) is integrated
with the air switch and the controllable grid-connected The effectiveness of the proposed VF control can be
contactor, which could isolate or connect PCS to the grid. The verified through the following vector diagram (Figure 3).
comprehensive controller is the core unit of PCS, which is
integrated with data sampling, analysis, and control algorithm b E
designing. q V
III. CONTROL STRATEGY Vd
d
Vd c dc
The critical function of PCS is dual-mode operation. 'T
Vc
Constant voltage and constant frequency control (VF control)
is employed in stand-alone mode. Meanwhile, power control T Tc
a D
Vq
(PQ control) is applied to grid-connect mode. The control
strategies are demonstrated in detail as below. Vqc

A. VF Control
When working in stand-alone mode, PCS is controlled as c
the main power source to provide constant voltage and Figure 3. Space vector analysis of VF control
frequency with VF control.
As demonstrated in Figure 3, ideally, the d axis
To achieve constant VF control, the control structure with component (Vd) of the expected output voltage(V) should be
close-loop control of an outer voltage loop is adopted. The equal to V in terms of magnitude, and the angle( T ) between
voltage loop control equation utilizing a PI regulator is as
Vd and the a axis should be 2S ft , Where f denotes the
follows:
frequency. The q axis component (Vq) is zero. However, due
­ 1 to the inductor of PCS and sampling error in real situation,
° vdr = k p (1  ) *(vdref  vd ) the sample data have a certain deviation to the expectations.
° Ti s
® (1) Suppose that the deviation between expected angle ( T )
°v =k (1  1 ) *(v  v ) and actual angle ( T c ) is 'T , and T lags behind T c .
°̄ qr p Ti s
qref q
Therefore, the expected d axis component Vd is small than the
where kp and Ti are the proportional gain and integral time actual value Vd c , that is:
constant of the voltage loop controller, respectively.
'vd Vd  Vd c  0 (2)
The VF control block diagram corresponding to Equation
(1), is shown in Figure 2. Then, the PI regulator of the d axis will regulate the
output value to decrease vdr and make actual value catch up
with the expected value. Similarly, the regulation process is
 3

almost the same in the q axis. Herein, the actual output regulators. In addition, the space vector PWM (SVPWM)
voltage ( V c ) will converge towards the expected output method is used for generating IGBT-driven signals.
voltage (V). The proposed PQ control is equivalent simplification of
Consequently, the proposed VF control has good the traditional control methods, by eliminating two PI control
performance of dynamic response though it only includes a units and realizing the decoupling control of active and
voltage-loop. Moreover, only two PI regulators are adopted in reactive power. It improves the practicability in engineering.
VF control, which is simple compared to traditional VF
control [11]. IV. CONTROLLER DESIGN
The PCS controller mainly consists of the hardware
B. PQ Control circuit and the software structure. The harmonious design
When operating in grid-connected mode, PCS is scheme between them is shown as follows:
controlled as a power buffer to provide power flow with PQ
control. Active power and reactive power are described as
Layer4
follows, based on the instantaneous reactive power theory Control strategies VF control Stand-alone PQ control Grid-connect
without considering the isolation transformer:
Software
­° p 1.5(vd id  vq iq ) coordinate Voltage coordinate
® (3) Layer3 transform outer-loop Current loop transform
°̄ q 1.5(vq id  vd iq ) Algorithm PLL SVPWM PLL

Assume that voltage vector is in the same direction as the AD

switch logic AD
Layer2 sampling sampling
d axis, then the q axis component of voltage is zero. Data acquisition Measure IGBT driven Measure
Therefore, Equation (3) can be expressed as follows:
Hardware

­° p 1.5*vd id
® (4) Layer1

°̄ q 1.5*vd iq
Primary circuit Battery

PCS
Furthermore, given the influence of the isolation
transformer, the current reference can be achieved as below: Figure 5. Design scheme of PCS controller
In Figure 5, the hardware layer mainly includes IGBT
­ Pref driven and analog data acquisitions, such as voltage and
°idref =
° 1.5*vd *K (5) current sampling. The software layer is responsible for data
® analysis and algorithm together with the important control
°i = Qref
°̄ qref 1.5*vd *K strategies. In addition, protection is included in both hardware
and software. The multilayer coordination design scheme can
where Pref and Qref represent the expected output active power ensure the reliable operation of PCS.

and reactive power, respectively, and K is the transformer A. Secondary Circuit

ratio shown in Figure 1. To reflect the real-time and fast response of receiving
On the basis of traditional methods of power-outer-loop PCS control instructions, dual DSP is adopted in the
and current-inner-loop[12], a simplified PQ control is secondary circuit, which is described in Figure 6.
proposed as follows:
crystal crystal
oscillator oscillator
vd
idr + - id +
+
vdr control bus
Pref ¦ PI
¦ vD
LCD
­ Pref RS485
°idr = - analog signal AD
state return
serial
° 1.5*vd *K Z (L +LT ) dq SVPWM parallel address bus
® to sampling address bus port PC
Qref °i = -Qref
vE generator PWM data bus TMS320 TMS320
DE F2812 dual F2812
°̄ qr 1.5*vd *K Z (L +LT ) pulse IGBT driven PWM pulse control bus port control bus
+ v DSP RAM DSP serial
+ ¦ qr T fault signal fault signal (Main) ( auxiliary)
+ ¦
PI signal clock
iqr - + I/O(control) data bus data bus
iq vq switch signal
isolation
I/O(return)
serial
EEPROM
output/input
Figure 4. PQ control structure diagram

In Figure 4, the dq frame quantities of current reference JTAG JTAG

are obtained by firstly calculating equation (5), and then the Figure 6. Structure of dual DSP
current loop is used to regulate the output value with PI
As shown in Figure 6, TMS320F2812 is applied to realize
dual DSP control, which is the core control chip with a
 4

dominant frequency of 90MHz and strong real-time control

and PWM event management [13]. Therein, the main DSP is
3&6
primarily in charge of data acquisition, calculation and PWM FRQWUROOHU

generation, and the main DSP also has the functions of logic
control and system protection. Meanwhile, the auxiliary DSP
is mainly responsible for data communication and fault
information recording. Much information is uploaded to the 5HVLVWRU
liquid crystal display (LCD) and the personal computer (PC) )LOWHU

through the RS485 serial port; meanwhile, the operation

commands are downloaded to the main DSP through the &RQWDFWRU

dual-port RAM (Random Access Memory). The data

communication between the main DSP and the auxiliary DSP
is also realized by the dual-port RAM. At the same time, only ,QGXFWRU

a DSP could use the dual-port RAM, which can ensure quick
and reliable data transmission. Figure 8. Experimental PCS device
B. Software Structure The outline of the PCS device is shown in Figure 8. The
Based on the secondary circuit with dual DSP, the parameters correspond to those in Table 1.
software of the PCS control system is designed in modules, A. Description about the Application Field
which is responsible for control algorithm, data
communication and integrated protection. The main flow The developed PCS device is applied in the microgrid in
chart of the control algorithm is presented as follows: Xuancheng, Anhui province, China. The microgrid is
constructed by Tsinghua University together with some
Start
companies. The microgrid structure is shown in Figure 9 [14].
system initial check N $&EXV
passed˛ Stop
initial check
N:OLJKWLQJ N:ZDWHUKHDWHU
Y
N:LQYHUWHU
grid-connect switch '&
mode is closed?
selection N: 'LVWULEXWLRQ
39VKHG 0DQDJHPHQW N:LQYHUWHU
N Y
6\VWHP
VF control PQ control N:LQYHUWHU
operation $$3)
N:3&6
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Figure 7. Main flow chart of DSP control algorithm N:
39URRIV Ă
In Figure 7, the main flow chart of the control algorithm N:0LFURLQYHUWHU N:K
/L%DWWHU\
illustrates the preparation of initial check, operation mode %(66
selection and every mode operating independently. The three Figure 9. Microgrid structure
parts work sequentially, which can improve the system
The installed capacity of the microgid is 100kW, which
reliability.
mainly consists of the 60kW PV shed and 40kW PV roofs.
V. FIELD APPLICATION AND TEST Furthermore, controllable loads, active power filter (APF)
and BESS are all configured in the microgrid to enhance the
According to the technique proposed above, a 50kW PCS flexibility and reliability.
is developed. The main parameters and the experimental PCS B. Test results
device are depicted in Table I and Figure 8, respectively.
(1) stand-alone mode
TABLE I. RELATIVE PARAMETERS OF PCS DEVICE
In this test, the expected root mean square value (RMS) of
Parameters Value
rated capacity 50kW
the output voltage is set at 220V and the frequency is 50Hz.
The test results are presented as below.
line voltage 380V/50Hz
filter inductor L 0.4mH
filter capacitor C 30uF
damping resistance R 0.2Ω
isolation transformer T 60kVAˈK=4/2.5
switch frequency f0 6.4kHz
dc-link capacitor C0 6000uF
rated DC voltage u dc 530V
 5

DC voltage As shown in Figure 12, the AC voltage and current are in

the same phase, which indicates that the PCS is transmitting
AC voltage positive active power to the grid. The value of power can be
of phase A calculated as the product of RMS of voltage and current,
AC voltage
(200V/div)
which is about 21kW.
DC voltage
(200V/div)
The result of the input active power with 20kW is shown
in Figure 13:
DC voltage AC voltage AC current
of phase A of phase A

t (100ms/div) AC voltage
(200V/div)
Figure 10. Voltage waveform of starting process
AC current
Figure 10 shows the starting process of PCS. It can be (50A/div)
seen that the DC voltage is almost constant at about 530V, DC voltage
(200V/div)
and the AC voltage increases slowly from zero to the
expected value. That is the so called soft-start, which is good
for PCS starting without any inrushes. The steady state is
indicated in Figure 11 as below. t (20ms/div)
Figure 13. Voltage and current waveform of input active power with 20kW
DC voltage
Noticeably, the AC voltage and current are in the opposite
AC voltage phase as can be seen from Figure 13. It illustrates that the
of phase A
PCS is absorbing active power from the grid. The actual
AC voltage value of the input power approaches 20kW.
(200V/div)
DC voltage
From Figure 12 and Figure 13, it can be seen that PCS can
(200V/div) achieve power interaction between microgrid and power grid
at the expected values, thus meeting the demands of operating
in grid-connected mode.
VI. CONCLUSION
t (20ms/div)
Figure 11. Voltage waveform of steady operation In view of the operation requirements of microgrid in both
As can be seen from Figure 11, the RMS of the output stand-alone mode and grid-connected mode, this paper
voltage of PCS is about 223V/50Hz, which is almost the proposed an industrial oriented control strategy for PCS.
same as the expected value. Moreover, the voltage waveform Based on the feasibility design scheme, a 50kW PCS device
is developed and applied in field, which is integrated with
is smooth with little harmonic distortion. It indicates that the
PCS can provide stable voltage and frequency for microgrid many functions, such as dual-mode operation,
operating in stand-alone mode. communication, and display and protection. The field test
results show excellent performance of the developed PCS,
(2) grid-connected mode which could be widely applied in practice.
The tests of grid-connected mode include two occasions:
the expected output active power with 20kW and the
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