A Fuzzy Logic Controller for Autonomous Operation of a Voltage Source Converter-Based Distributed Generation System

This paper presents a fuzzy logic controller (FLC) for autonomous (islanded) operation of an electronically interfaced distributed generation unit and its load. In the grid-connected mode, the voltage-sourced converter is operated in the active and reactive power (PQ) control mode, where a conventional control scheme is used to control the active and reactive power exchange with the grid. In the islanded mode, the proposed FLC is used to control the voltage of the islanded system despite the load variability and uncertainties. In addition, this paper also presents the use of the black-box nonlinear optimization technique to tune the parameters of the membership functions of the FLC in order to achieve optimal performance. The salient features of the proposed FLC are: 1) efficient to deal with the nonlinear systems; 2) design does not depend on the mathematical model of the system; and 3) less sensitive to the parameters variation than the conventional controllers. The frequency of the islanded system is dictated through the use of an internal oscillator. The effectiveness of the proposed FLC in controlling the voltage of the islanded system, irrespective of the load variability, is extensively validated based on simulation studies in the PSCAD/EMTDC environment. Moreover, the paper highlights the superiority of the proposed FLC over the conventional proportional-integral controllers through comparing the transient responses of the system based on both controllers.