A survey of distributed power system — AC versus DC distributed power system

Abstract

The history of the centralized and distributed power system is introduced far away from the power system being first built by Edison, which started the first confrontation between ac and dc power system. Although ac power system has dominated for a long century because of easy transmission and some other benefits, dc power system has still gave some good performances and attracted more attention during the past three decades. This paper will discuss the current developing stage of dc distributed power system by the following contents: the basic structure and characteristics; the benefits of the dc distribution system; the development of current techniques adopted in DPS and its analysis of protection and system interaction. In additional, the comparisons between dc and ac distributed power system are presented in detail, and finally, the challenge in future is also summarized.