Ah33186193

Y Jaganmohan Reddy, Y V Pavan Kumar, K Padma Raju, Anilkumar Ramsesh / International
Journal of Engineering Research and Applications (IJERA) ISSN: 2248-9622 www.ijera.com
Vol. 3, Issue 3, May-Jun 2013, pp.186-193
186 | P a g e
PLC Based Energy Management and Control Design for an
Alternative Energy Power System with Improved Power Quality
Y Jaganmohan Reddy*, Y V Pavan Kumar*, K Padma Raju†
, Anilkumar Ramsesh*
*
Honeywell Technology Solutions Lab (Pvt) Ltd, Hyderabad, India
†
Department of ECE, Jawaharlal Nehru Technological University Kakinada, India
Abstract-- This paper describes modeling and
simulation of a renewable energy based hybrid
power system in the aspects of improving power
quality, energy management and control, because
optimal utilization of primary energy sources will
increase the level of supply reliability. In order to
meet sustained load demands during varying
natural conditions, different renewable energy
sources and converters are need to be integrated
with each other. The paper focuses on the
combination of Photo Voltaic (PV) cell System,
Wind turbine system, Fuel cell (FC), and Battery
systems for power generation, and to improve
power quality we are proposing Motor-
Generator model instead of using static
converters, and an energy management and
control unit using Programmable Logic
Controller (PLC). Since wind turbine output
power varies with the wind speed, the PV cell
output power varies with both the temperature
and irradiance, and a FC output power varies
with input fuel, and so, along with DC Motor,
Diesel engine is also coupled to ensure that the
overall system performs under all conditions,
especially when PV, Wind, FC power is not
enough to drive DC motor. Excess energy when
available, is converted to hydrogen using an
electrolyzer for later use in the fuel cell for the
economic use of fuel. The results show that the
proposed hybrid power system can effectively
manage the optimal utilization of primary energy
sources and improves the power quality in both
islanding mode and as well as grid connected
mode.
Keywords—Hybrid Power system, Renewable
energy Sources, DC Motor-Synchronous
Generator set, Diesel engine, Islanding (Isolated)
mode and grid connected mode, and Energy
Management, PLCs.
I. INTRODUCTION
Energy demand in isolated mode or grid
connected mode of applications is steadily
increasing. Thus, it is very important to meet the
continually increasing demand of power. On the
other hand, there is a social interest for global
environmental concerns such as green house effect
and global warming and a reduction in fossil fuel
resources. The solution for these issues can be
considered from the recent research and
development of alternative energy sources which
has excellent potential as a form of contribution to
conventional power generation system. i.e., to
introduce renewable energy, such as Photovoltaic,
Fuel cell and wind energy. This is clean and
abundantly available in nature, offers many
advantages over conventional power generation
system, such as low pollution, high efficiency,
diversity of fuels, reusability of exhausts, and onsite
installation. The system consists of PV panels, wind
power system and fuel cell system. Electrolyzers are
used to absorb the rapidly fluctuating output power
with load and generate hydrogen. The generated
hydrogen is stored in the hydrogen tank and used as
fuel for fuel cells, which reduces the fuel cost.
Combining several different types of power
sources will form the system called "Hybrid Power
system". Hybrid power systems (HPS) combine two
or more energy conversion devices, or two or more
fuels for the same device, that when integrated,
overcome limitations inherent in either. Hybrid
power systems are designed for the generation and
use of electrical power. They are available in two
modes; namely islanding (isolating) mode and grid
connected mode. In general, a hybrid power system
might contain alternating current (AC) diesel
generators, an AC distribution system, a Direct
current (DC) distribution system, loads, renewable
power sources, energy storage, power converters,
rotary converters, coupled diesel system, dump
loads, load management options, or a supervisory.
In the system, the output of the renewable
sources cannot feed the load directly because their
voltage fluctuations are so large that they will
damage the concerned load. So first it needs to be
conditioned, for that generally dc-dc/ac-dc
converters are used. Thus the varying voltage can be
brought to required value and specified variations
limits by varying the duty ratio of the converters,
and then connected to DC bus.
II. PROPOSED SYSTEM
The DC bus voltage is now used to drive
the DC motor coupled to the synchronous generator.
Electrical power should be produced exactly at the
same time when it is needed. It may not be possible
for renewable energy sources like wind, PV, and FC

187 | P a g e
to produce sufficient energy to drive DC motor
coupled to synchronous generator at all the time,
since their operation depends on varying natural
conditions. So, diesel engine is also coupled to
synchronous generator to avoid shortages of power.
In the proposed system shown in figure.1, the
DC motor, Alternator and Diesel Engine are
mechanically connected using an electrical clutch.
The DC bus is used for integrating all the sources
and storage of energy like PV, Wind, battery, etc.
To have an optimum, efficient and reliable operation
of the complex system consist of various power
sources, a control is needed. Hence microgrid
controller which also acts as Energy management
unit is designed using PLC. Modeling and
simulations are conducted using
MATLAB/Simulink [1] to verify the effectiveness
of the proposed system.
Figure.1. Proposed System Block diagram
III. MODELING AND SIMULATION
A. Fuel cells
A fuel cell is a device that uses hydrogen as
a fuel to produce electrons, protons, heat and water.
Fuel cells are electrochemical devices that convert
the chemical energy of a reaction directly into
electrical energy. It must respond quickly to changes
in load and have low maintenance requirement as
well as a long cell life [2].The basic building block
of a fuel cell consists of an electrolyte layer in
contact with a porous anode and cathode on either
side. In the Schematic of fuel cell, gaseous fuels are
fed continuously to the anode, and an oxidant i.e.,
oxygen from air, is fed continuously to the cathode
compartment, the electrochemical reactions take
place at the electrodes to produce an electric current.
A fuel cell is individual small unit of around 1.2V.
A group of units are connected in series and in
parallel to get required voltage and current ratings,
that group is called fuel cell stack [3]. Current fuel
cells, when operated alone have efficiencies of
about 40%-55%. Fuel cell technology is based upon
the simple combustion reaction,
2H2 +O2  2H2O
(1)
Hydrogen and oxygen pass over each of the
electrodes and through means of a chemical
reaction, electricity, heat and water are produced.
Figure.2. Performance of fuel cell Figure.3. V-I
characteristics of fuel cell with change in fuel
pressure
Fuel cell is modeled in Matlab/Simulink
with the help of modeling equations given as the
thermodynamic potential E is defined via a Nernst
equation in expanded form as [4]
E=1.229-0.85*10-3
*(T-298.15) +
4.3085*10-5
*T* (lnPH2+lnPo2)
(2)
The concentration of dissolved oxygen at the
gas/liquid interface can be defined by a Henry’s law
Co2=Po2 / (5.08*106
exp (-498/T))
(3)
The parametric equation for the over-voltage
due to activation and internal resistance developed
from the empirical analysis is given as
ήact = -0.9514+0.00312T – 0.000187 T ln(i)
+
7.4 * 10-5
T ln (Co2)
(4)
Ract = 0.01605 – 3.5 * 10-5
T + 8 * 10-5
I
(5) Ra = - ήact / i
(6)
The combined effect of thermodynamics,
mass transport, kinetics, and ohmic resistance
determines the output voltage of the cell as
V = E – vact + ήohmic
(7)
The steady state fuel cell model described
above indicates that the current drawn, cell
temperature, H2 pressure, and O2 pressure will
affect the fuel cell output voltage. A drop in fuel cell
voltage can be compensated by an increase in fuel
pressure.
The ohmic voltage loss in the fuel cell is given by
ήohmic = -i*Rint
(8)

188 | P a g e
The fuel cell system consists of a stack of 65
similar cells connected in series. Therefore, the total
stack voltage is given by Vstack = 65* Vcell (9)
The amount of hydrogen and oxygen
consumed in the fuel cell depends upon the input
and output flow rates and the current drawn out of
the fuel cell. It also depends upon the volume of the
electrodes. If the incoming and outgoing flow rates
(mol/s) are known, then the gas pressure within the
fuel cell humidifier can be determined using the
mole conservation principle. Figure 4, shows the
Simulink model of fuel cell.
For the fuel cell anode
(Va/RT)
dt
dPH2
=m´H2in–(ρH2UA)out–(I/2F) (10)
Similarly, the equation for the cathode is
(Va/RT)
dt
dPO2
= mo2 in – (ρO2 UA) out – (I/4F) (11)
Figure.4.Simulink model of fuel cell
B. Electrolyzer
The decomposition of water into hydrogen and
oxygen can be achieved by passing an electric
current between two electrodes separated by an
aqueous electrolyte [5], [6]. The total reaction for
splitting water is;
H2O (1) +electrical energy = H2 + ½ O2 (g) (12)
A water electrolyzer consists of several
electrolyzer cells connected in series. The current
vs. voltage characteristics of an electrolyzer depend
upon its working temperature, According to
Faraday’s law, the production rate of hydrogen in an
electrolyzer cell is directly proportional to the
transfer rate of electrons at the electrodes, which in
turn is equivalent to the electrical current in the
circuit.
ήH2 = ήF ήc ie/2/F (mol/s) (13)
Faraday efficiency is the ratio between the
actual and theoretical maximum amount of
hydrogen produced in the electrolyzer. Assuming an
electrolyzer working temperature of 40o
C, Faraday
efficiency (in percent) can be given as
ήF = 96.5 exp (0.09/Ie – 75.5/ie
2
) (14)
The two equations above give a simple
electrolyzer model with the assumption that the
electrolyzer has an independent cooling system to
maintain its temperature at 400
C. For simplification,
dynamic modeling of the electrolyzer and fuel cell’s
auxiliary equipment, such as hydrogen storage
vessel, compressor, piping, valves etc., was not
considered.
Figure.5. Electrolyzer subsystem model
C. PV Panel
Photovoltaic/solar cell is the device which
converts sunlight into electricity directly of which
magnitude of current and voltage depends on many
factors like temperature, solar irradiation, and wave
length of incident photon etc. the solar cell produces
DC supply.
A solar cell module is the basic element of
each photovoltaic system. It consists of many jointly
connected solar cells. A number of solar cell models
have been developed, but the one diode electrical
equivalent circuit is commonly used for cell based
or module based analysis. It consists of a diode, a
current source, a series resistance and a parallel
resistance. The current source generates the photo-
current that is a function of the incident solar cell
radiation and temperature [7], [8].
This voltage loss is expressed by a series
resistance (Rs). Furthermore leakage currents are
described by a parallel resistance (Rsh). However,
the series resistance is very small and the parallel
resistance is very large [8]. So we can ignore Rs and
Rsh.
Figure.6. solar cell (a) equivalent circuit (b)
simplified circuit

189 | P a g e
Figure.7. PV array V-I characteristics
PV panel is modeled in Simulink [10]. Figure
8, shows Simulink model of PV panel. The
modeling equations used to develop the PV panel
model are;
The solar cell current equation is
   mpI1(t)tt0.002E(t)aTα
stE
(t)ttE
1
OCV2C
mpV
exp1C1SCIPVI 

























 (15
)
The solar cell voltage equation is
 
















 (t)tt0.02E(t)aTβ
stE
(t)ttE
0.0539log1mpVPVV (16
)







 









ocVC
mpV
scI
mpV
C
2
exp11
(17)



















scI
mpI
ocV
mpV
C
1ln
1
2 (18)
Figure.8. Simulink model of PV panel
D. Wind Power
The power output of wind turbine is
relating to wind speed with a cubic ratio. The power
curve of the wind turbine AIR 403 studied is
nonlinear, [10] which is digitized and the resulting
table is used for simulation as Fig. 3. Both the first
order moment of inertia (J) and a friction based
dynamic model for the wind turbine rotor, and a first
order model for the permanent magnet generator are
adopted. The dynamics of the wind turbine due to its
rotor inertia and generator are added by considering
the wind turbine response as a second order slightly
under-damped system [7], [9]. Using this simple
approach, small wind turbine dynamic is modeled as
Pg(s)/Pwt(s) = 0.25/ (s2
+0.707s+0.25)
(19)
Figure.9. Simulink model of Wind turbine
E. DC Motor-Synchronous Generator set
In order to improve power quality, the DC
bus voltage is used to drive motor-generator set as
shown in the following figure.10, instead of giving
to static converters. This is modeled as figure.12.
Figure.10. Synchronous generator with prime mover
DC motor
Figure.11. Speed control of a sep excited DC motor

190 | P a g e
Figure.12. Simulink model of DC motor, Diesel
engine-Generator set
F. Diesel Engine setup
To simulate the complete dynamics of a
diesel engine system, a very large order model will
be required. However for most studies on speed
dynamics of internal combustion engines, it is
sufficient to use a lower order model [11]. Similar
approaches have been adopted in diesel engine
simulation studies.
Figure.13. Block diagram of a diesel engine system
Figure.14. Governor & diesel engine subsystem
G. Proposed Hybrid power system model
Figure.15. Proposed Hybrid power system model using Simulink
IV. ENERGY MANAGEMENT AND
CONTROL SYSTEM
The energy management system (EMS)
switches the mode of power supply, and controls
the load share according to the condition of wind
power, solar radiation, Fuel cell power and load
requirement. In general wind speed and solar
radiation changes at random, in that conditions
energy management plays important role.
Generated power of hybrid system is compare with
the load. If generated power exceeds the load, then
excess power will be collected by the electrolyzer.
The electrolyzer can produce H2 gas and is stored in
H2 reservoir tank. Energy management unit monitors
the H2 reservoir tank. If H2 reservoir tank is full, and
hence excess power is used to charge the battery.
The storage batteries compensate the load supply
when the output power from the wind power
generator , Solar and fuel cell is deficient. And its
charging status is also monitored by the EMS on-

191 | P a g e
time. If the load is more than the generated power,
then the load is connected to the grid. In that case the
EMS checks for the frequency and controls it.
In the relatively low capacity of the micro-
gird power systems, there are flexible choices for
demand side to increase the efficiency of the system
operation and economics. Therefore, using demand
side management to opportunely control load, would
reduce the need of generation capacity and increase
the utilization of renewable generation devices and
accordingly increase the efficiency of generation
investment. Integration of the all blocks by using
EMS can provide flexible energy consumption
management solution for improving power quality of
the renewable energy hybrid micro grid power
system. The hybrid power system is based on multi-
agents theory [12], so the control subsystem is
regarded as an agent. It is composed of
programmable logic controller (PLC), human-
machine interface (HMI), grid-connected control
module, AC multi-function electric power meters,
and DC electric power meters, RS485/TCP
converter etc., to control and manage the operation
of multi-source, such as power grid, wind turbine
generation, solar photovoltaic, storage batteries and
loads, also to acquire data and communicate with
others.
The system is composed of several
modules. Their functions are controlled by PLC, the
controller of the subsystem, is FBs-40MAT from
FATEK. It is responsible for energy management
and control of the whole system.
By considering the above mentioned
conditions as reference PLC is programmed. More
recently, PLCs are programmed using application
software on personal computers. The computer is
connected to the PLC through Ethernet, RS-232, RS-
485 or RS-422 cabling. The programming software
allows entry and editing of the ladder-style logic.
Generally the software provides functions for
debugging and troubleshooting the PLC software,
for example, by highlighting portions of the logic to
show current status during operation or via
simulation. The software will upload and download
the PLC program, for backup and restoration
purposes. In some models of programmable
controller, the program is transferred from a personal
computer to the PLC though a programming board
which writes the program into a removable chip such
as an EEPROM or EPROM.
PLCs have built in communications ports,
usually 9-pin RS-232, but optionally EIA-485 or
Ethernet. Mod bus, BAC net or DF1 is usually
included as one of the communications protocols.
Other options include various field buses such as
Device Net or Profi bus. Other communications
protocols that may be used are listed in the List of
automation protocols. Most modern PLCs can
communicate over a network to some other system,
such as a computer running a SCADA (Supervisory
Control and Data Acquisition) system or web
browser. PLCs used in larger I/O systems may have
peer-to-peer (P2P) communication between
processors.
This allows separate parts of a complex
process to have individual control while allowing the
subsystems to co-ordinate over the communication
link. These communication links are also often used
for HMI devices such as keypads or PC-type
workstations.
Figure.16. Photograph of the (a) Basic PLC Panel
(b) EMS Control box
V. SIMULATION RESULTS OF THE HPS
A. PV and FC
Figure.17. Voltage of the PV panel.
Figure.18. Current of the PV panel.
Figure.19. Power output of PV
Figure.20. Fuel Cell stack voltage

192 | P a g e
Figure.21. Current drawn from FC
Figure.22.Duty ratio of DC-DC converter.
B. Total Integrated System Outputs
All the components such as PV panel, PEM
fuel cell, Wind system, and DC-DC converters, etc.,
which are individually modeled, and are integrated
for simulation. With respect to the variation in
natural conditions, the outputs of PV, FC, and Wind
turbine systems are primarily controlled by varying
duty cycles of DC-DC converters (Figure.22).
Figure.23. Power output from Hybrid power system.
Figure.24. Phase Voltages of Hybrid power system.
VI. CONCLUSION
In this paper, a renewable energy based
hybrid power system, its energy management and
control system is proposed. It is modeled for an
isolated load/grid connected load, with the method
of using DC Motor-Alternator setup instead of using
static converters. Along with DC Motor, Diesel
engine is also coupled to ensure that the overall
system performs under all conditions, especially
when PV, Wind, FC power is not enough to drive
DC motor. This proposed system facilitates
improvement in power quality, which ensures
continuous and reliable supply to loads. Voltage,
Speed, Frequency variations at the output/grid is
found to be within the acceptable range, which is
shown in Figure 23 and Figure 24. The energy
management and control unit is designed using PLC
and HMI, which facilitates effective control on the
entire power system. Therefore, this system can
tolerate the rapid changes in load and environmental
conditions, and suppress the effects of these
fluctuations and provides optimum utilization of
available resources.
REFERENCES
[1] The Math Works http://www.mathworks.com
[2] B. Delfino and F. Fornari, “Modeling and
Control of an Integrated Fuel Cell-Wind
Turbine System,” in Proc. 2003 IEEE
Bologna Power Tech Conf., pp. 23-26.
[3] A. Rowe and X. Li, “Mathematical Modeling
of Proton Exchange Membrane Fuel Cells,”
Journal of Power Sources, pp. 82-96, 2001.
[4] S. M. Shaahid and M. A. Elhadidy,
“Technical and Economic Assessment of
Grid independent Hybrid Photovoltaic-Diesel-
Battery Power Systems for Commercial
Loads in Desert Environments,” Renewable
and Sustainable Energy Reviews, vol. 11, pp.
1794-1810, Oct. 2007.
[5] O. Ulleberg, "Stand-alone Power Systems for
the Future: Optimal Design, Operation and
Control of Solar-Hydrogen Energy Systems,"
Ph.D. dissertation, Norwegian University of
Science and Technology, 1997.
[6] K. Sapru, N. T. Stetson, and S. R. Ovshinsky,
"Development of a Small Scale Hydrogen
Production Storage System for Hydrogen
Applications," in Proc. 1997 the 32nd
Intersociety Conf., vol. 3, pp. 1947-1952.
[7] M. J. Khan and M. T. Iqbal, “Dynamic
Modeling and Simulation of a Small Wind-
Fuel Cell Hybrid Energy System,” Renewable
Energy, pp. 421-439, 2005.
[8] D. B. Nelson, M. H. Nehrir, and C. Wang,
“Unit Sizing and Cost Analysis of Stand-

193 | P a g e
Alone Hybrid Wind/PV/FC Power Systems,”
Renewable Energy, pp. 1641-1656, 2006.
[9] B. C. Kuo, Automatic control systems, 7th
ed.
New York: Prentice Hall Inc, 1995.
[10] Hung-Cheng Chen, Jian-Cong Qiu, and Chia-
Hao Liu “Dynamic Modeling and Simulation
of Renewable Energy Based Hybrid Power
Systems,” DRPT, April 2008, pp. 2803-2809.
[11] Takyin Taky Chan, “Transient analysis of
integrated solar/diesel hybrid power system
using MATLAB Simulink,” School of
Electrical Engineering, Victoria University.
[12] Guangming LI, Yuanrui CHEN, Tao LI “The
Realization of Control Subsystem in the
Energy Management of Wind/Solar Hybrid
Power System,” 3rd
International Conference
on Power Electronics Systems and
Applications, 2009.
[13] Caisheng Wang, M.Hashem Nehrir, "Power
Management of a standalone Wind/PV/FC
energy system," IEEE transactions on energy
conversion, Vol.23, No.3, September 2008.
[14] A.A.Salam, A.Mohamed and A.Hannan,
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AUTHOR BIOGRAPHIES
Y Jaganmohan Reddy
received B. Tech in the area
of Electronics and
Instrumentation Engineering
in 1997 from Kakatiya
University, Master of Science
in BITS Pilani in 2004,
pursuing the Ph. D degree in the field of HPS
automation at JNTU Kakinada, India. Currently, he
is working as Senior Systems Engineer in Process
Solutions, Honeywell Technology Solutions Lab,
India. He has an experience of 15 years in the field
of industrial automation and control as a
Maintenance engineer, Project engineer, Test
engineer, Manager. He has published 25 research
papers and 2 International monograph on the
concepts of Power Quality, Energy Management and
Real Time Control, Hardware Simulation for Smart
grids in various international forums.
Y V Pavan Kumar received
B. Tech in the area of
Electrical and Electronics
Engineering in 2007 from
JNTU Hyderabad, India,
M.Tech in the area of
Instrumentation and Control
Systems in the year 2011 from JNTU Kakinada,
India. He has 2 years of teaching experience in
Electrical Engineering, and 2 years in Control,
Power Systems, and Engineering Test Systems
Design for Aerospace Systems. Currently he is
working as a Design Engineer in Aerospace
Engineering Test Services, Honeywell Technology
Solutions Lab, India. He has published 25 research
papers in International Journals/Conferences and 2
International monographs. His research area includes
Power systems, Aerospace Systems, Advanced
Control systems, and Artificial Intelligence.
K. Padma Raju received
B.Tech from Nagarjuna
University, M.Tech from
NITW, Ph. D from Andhra
University, India in 1989, 1992
& 2005 respectively and Post
Doctoral Fellowship at Hoseo
University, South Korea in
2007. He has worked as Digital Signal Processing
engineer in Signion Systems, Hyderabad, India
before joining Jawaharlal Nehru Technological
University Kakinada, India. He has 20 years of
teaching experience and is Professor of ECE,
JNTUK, India. Currently he is working as Principal,
College of engineering, JNTUK. Prior to this, he has
worked as IIIP&T Director for JNTUK. He has also
worked as a Professor at Hoseo University, South
Korea during 2006-2007. He has published 40
research papers in National/ International Journals/
Conferences and guiding 10 research students in the
areas of Antennas, Smart grids, and
Communications. He is Fellow of IETE & IE and
Life Member of ISTE & SEMCE.
Anil Kumar Ramsesh received
Diploma in EE in 1987, B.E in
ECE from Bangalore
University, in 1995, M.Sc.
(Engg), & Ph.D in solar cell
instrumentation from IISc,
Bangalore, in 2000 & 2005
respectively. He is now working
as Fellow engineer in Honeywell Technology
Solutions Lab, Bangalore. Prior to Honeywell he
was with ISRO from 1987 till 2004 and was
involved in design of high power switching
amplifiers for electro-dynamic vibrators,
instrumentation for cryogenics, solar power systems.
He has around 25 disclosures, 14 patents filed, 4
patents granted till date and has 15 papers in
international journals. He is also a Member in Board
of Studies and Visiting faculty in School of
Electronics, Vellore Institute of Technology.

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