Microgrid Plant Design with Explicit Dynamic Performance Guarantees

State-of-the-art microgrids are typically custom configurations of off-the-shelf equipment and custom software, but they often overlook power electronics control and system stability during design, resulting in suboptimal solutions that are not tailored to specific microgrid architecture, equipment, and physical or economic environment. This paper proposes a novel microgrid design tool that yields optimal equipment selection and guarantees system stability under different contingencies. The microgrid plant design problem has been formulated as a mixed integer linear programming type optimization problem that provides the optimal types, sizing, and placement for distributed energy resources aiming to minimize the total cost. The microgrid dynamic model is built using nonlinear differential and algebraic equations referenced to a common reference frame. The model captures the averaged dynamics of the inverter-based resources, the network, and the loads. The feasible controller space is evaluated using the IEEE 1547 standard under an islanding event. Then, the inverter controller parameters are optimally tuned based on a performance metric. The advantages of the proposed tool over the state-of-the-art microgrid design tools are shown through case studies on the Banshee Distribution Feeder.