Control Strategies for Bidirectional DC-DC Converters: An Overview

Abstract

Abstract The energy produced by renewable energy sources has variations as these sources are sensitive to weather conditions. To overcome this problem, storage devices like batteries are used for stabilization. Bidirectional DC-DC converter is the main component to interface renewable energy sources with energy storage devices. With the help of proper switching techniques, these converters have the ability to increase or decrease the level of the voltages and can handle the power flow in both directions, from source to storage device (forward direction/charging mode), as well as from storage device to source (backward direction/discharging mode). Hence for an efficient system, the control of power flow must be very effective. This paper presents an overview of various bidirectional DC-DC converter’s classical and supervisory control methods that have been proposed in recent years.