State-of-charge-based droop control for stand-alone AC supply systems with distributed energy storage

Highlights: • A new droop control is developed based on the battery state-of-charge (SOC). • The P–f curve is shifted according to the battery SOC. • The SOC and power responses are optimized at the same time. • Simulation and experimental results validate the proposed strategy. - Abstract: The droop method is an advantageous technique for stand-alone AC supply systems, allowing for power sharing among various inverters with no need for communication cables. However, in stand-alone systems with multiple distributed energy storage units, the conventional droop methods are unable to control the storage unit state-of-charge (SOC) in order to change simultaneously. Existing techniques endeavor to solve this problem by changing the slope of the P–f curve however this solution compromises the power response performance. As an alternative, this paper proposes a new SOC-based droop control, whereby the P–f curve is shifted either upwards or downwards according to the battery SOC. The proposed technique makes it possible to select the time constant for the battery SOC convergence and, at the same time, to optimize the power response performance. The paper also shows how the SOC changes when the ratios between the battery capacity and the inverter rated power are different and how the proposed technique can limit the SOC imbalance. Simulation and experimental results corroborate the theoretical analysis.