Using low voltage MicroGrids for service restoration

Under normal operating conditions, a MicroGrid is interconnected with the medium voltage network; however, in order to deal with black start and islanded operation following a general blackout, an emergency operation mode must be envisaged. A sequence of actions and conditions to be checked during the restoration stage are identified and tested through numerical simulation. Voltage and frequency control approaches, inverter control modes, and the need of storage devices are addressed in this paper in order to ensure system stability, achieve robustness of operation, and not jeopardize power quality during service restoration in the low voltage area. Index Terms--Dynamic response, energy storage, frequency control, microgrid, power system dynamic stability, power system restoration.