Different Influence of Grid Impedance on Low- and High-Frequency Stability of PV Generators

Abstract

Recently, the stability issues when renewable energy sources are connected to the weak grid have obtained great attention. The popular view thinks that the grid impedance is adverse to the system stability. However, in this paper, it is first found that for the photovoltaic (PV) generator, the grid impedance has different influence on the system stability depending on the frequency range when the complete model of the PV generator is taken into consideration. That is, the increase of grid impedance can suppress the low-frequency (<;50 Hz) oscillation, whereas the increase of grid impedance degrades the high-frequency (>300 Hz) stability. Concretely, for the low-frequency range mainly dominated by the power loop and voltage loop of the PV generator, the describing function method is adopted to overcome discontinuity and nonlinearity of the power loop. Then, the low-frequency dynamics such as power oscillation can be analyzed accurately. For the high-frequency range mainly dominated by the phase-locked loop and current loop of the PV generator, the impedance analysis method is adopted to reveal the high-frequency instability mechanism. Through these analyses, the different influence of grid impedance on the low- and high-frequency stability of PV generators can be clearly distinguished. All the conclusions are verified through the real-time hardware-in-loop tests.