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The ever increasing demand for electricity has driven society toward the installation of new generation facilities. Concerns such as high costs associated with installation of new facilities, environmental pollution, higher transmission and distribution losses, depleting fossil fuels has created a lot of interest in exploring the renewable energy sources for generation, particularly near the load sites. Accordingly, emphasis has been put on Wind, and Photovoltaic (PV) energy systems. A study on the operational characteristics of these systems reveals that the power generation is high at certain optimal points and recognizing these optimum points and operating the system accordingly is an interesting and important part of the system design. Further, a hybrid Wind- PV system has higher reliability and generation capability when compared to either source alone, and as a result many such hybrid systems with an additional energy storage backup for increased reliability have been proposed. While the systems with energy storage are reported to have satisfactory performance, the energy storage component is typically found to incur the highest cost, requiring frequent maintenance and hence acts as a deterrent for increasing the renewable energy generation. Particularly, for small grid connected applications like shopping malls, office buildings, etc. any additional power that could not be provided by the hybrid system could be provided by the grid, and in case the power generation is higher it could be sent to the grid. For cases like this, it would be ideal if systems could be developed without energy storage, and maximum possible power could be extracted from the hybrid energy sources. Also, the power quality concerns posed due to the random nature of the power generated from the hybrid system, is an important issue that must be addressed. The conventional control methods used typically require overly sized component ratings, resulting in the degradation of the dynamic performance while adding to the cost of the system. This dissertation addresses these issues by proposing faster maximum power extraction algorithms from the hybrid renewable energy system, and proposes new control architecture for improving the output power quality to the grid.

The goal of this thesis is to design and fabricate a DC-to-DC converter for use in high-voltage capacitor charging applications. The primary objectives include increasing the efficiency and reducing the cost of traditional methods used for this application. Traditional methods were not designed specifically for high-voltage capacitor charging and were thus very primitive and exhibited lower efficiency. Prior methods made use of a high voltage power supply and a current limiting resistor or control scheme. The power supply would often only operate efficiently at a single voltage value and would thus function poorly over a range used in charging a capacitor. The resistor would also dissipate a fair amount of power, also limiting efficiency. This design makes use of a traditional flyback topology utilizing a controller developed specifically for this application, centering the design approach on the LT3750. Hence, taking full advantage of the efficiency improving control scheme it provides. Additionally, through the use of advanced techniques to eliminate noise and power losses, the efficiency may be significantly improved. A detailed theoretical analysis of the charger is also presented. The analysis will then be applied to optimization techniques to select ideal component values to meet specific design specifications. In this research, a specifically designed and developed prototype will be used to experimentally verify the theoretical work and optimization techniques.

Thyristor switched capacitors (TSCs) have found an ever increasing role in the operation of flexible AC transmission systems or FACTS. The ability of these static var compensators to regulate the voltage by consuming or supplying reactive power quickly is not only viable for transmission but is an effective measure for increasing power quality at a distribution level. The proposed design uses a variable number of logically switched capacitors to supply reactive generation per reactive demand. The design ensures that the capacitors are safely switched into service, reactive demand is accurately calculated, and the TSC will respond quickly to changes in demand. While providing fast and safe operation, the conceptual design is also flexible enough to allow for optimization of the TSC to meet the demands of specific loads.

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No description available.