IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2017 - 40

It is important for a standard to focus on the requirements
and functions applicable to a large range of microgrids and
microgrid control systems.

utility interconnection requirements or accepted utility and industry standards
✔ power, real and reactive, within agreed-upon ranges,
under steady-state and transient conditions, with accuracies and ramp rates, among others, defined in the
utility interconnection agreements and requirements
or accepted utility and industry practices.
Instrumentation, including sensors, measurement and
recording devices, data collection and analysis, and data formatting, are specified and depend upon the test environment
chosen. Options for the testing environment include
✔ in a real-time simulation environment, with hardwarein-the-loop testing of some or all of the hardware and/or
software constituting the microgrid control system
✔ in a real environment, reproducing all or part of the components of the microgrid installation, with the connection of the microgrid control system to the appropriate
devices; this allows for full-scale testing of the hardware,
software, and information and communications systems
making up the microgrid control system.

tested to ensure interoperability of the offerings from different
vendors, even though differing implementations are possible.
This platform-independent approach allows for flexibility
and customization of controllers and control algorithms to
be deployed, without limiting other potential functionalities,
while ensuring minimum requirements are met and comparative performance indices are set.
Defining core functions is the purpose of the IEEE
P2030.7 standard initiative. This initiative established core
functions and takes into account the needs and requirements
of the DSO and the microgrid operator. It also links the
functional specification to a testing approach, developed in
IEEE P2030.8.
The two core functions defined in the standards for a
microgrid control system are 1) the dispatch function, which
computes the set point of the DER units and the status of the
controllable loads in grid-connected and islanded modes and
2) the transition function, which defines the controller operation in the transition between grid-connected and islanded
modes and in the reconnection process.

Summary

For Further Reading

This article demonstrates the need and benefits of standards
to facilitate the deployment of a large number of DERs in the
distribution system within microgrids. Existing standards for
individual DERs are being updated to accommodate their
growing deployment, particularly inverter-based photovoltaic and storage systems. An alternative to connecting DERs
individually to the grid is to embed them in microgrids. A
key defining component of a microgrid is its control system,
which manages all aspects of the microgrid's operation, seen
from the point of interconnection to the distribution grid, in
both steady-state and transient operation.
Since there are many microgrid configurations, depending upon location and purpose, the requirements and functions of the microgrid and microgrid controller differ. For
this reason, it is important for a standard to focus on the
requirements and functions applicable to a large range of
microgrids and microgrid control systems, which are generic
and commonly implemented.
The ultimate aim of a standard is to strive to obtain industry consensus on what is required to conform to the standard.
There needs to be a balance between being prescriptive and
providing a wide latitude to users to choose from a range of
options to better meet the requirements of a given application.
There needs to be a clear set of core functions required and

"Powering microgrids for the 21st-century electrical system," NEMA MGRD 1-2016, Aug. 2016.
"Microgrids for critical facility resiliency in New York
State," Final Rep., NYSERDA Rep. 14-36, Dec. 2014.
W. Bower, D. Ton, R. Guttromson, S. Glover, J. Stamp,
D.Bhatnagar, and J. Reilly, "The advanced microgrid integration and interoperability," Sandia National Labs, Tech.
Rep. SAND2014-1535, Feb. 2014.
N. Hatziargyriou, Ed. Microgrids: Architectures and
Control. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley, Mar. 2014.
IEEE Standard for Interconnecting Distributed Resources with Electric Power Systems, IEEE Standard
1547, 2003.
IEEE Guide for the Interoperability of Energy Storage
Systems Integrated with the Electric Power Infrastructure,
IEEE Standard 2030.2, 2015.

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Biographies
Geza Joos is with McGill University, Montreal, Canada
Jim Reilly is with Reilly Associates, Red Bank, New Jersey.
Ward Bower is with Ward Bower Innovations LLC, New
Mexico.
Russ Neal is with the University of California, Irvine.
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july/august 2017

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of IEEE Power & Energy Magazine - July/August 2017