Improving the Sustainability of Self-Consumption with Cooperative DC Microgrids

The development of microgrids is of great interest to facilitate the integration of distributed generation in electricity networks, improving the sustainability of energy production. Microgrids in DC (DC-MG) provide advantages for the use of some types of renewable generation and energy storage systems, such as batteries. In this article, a possible practical implementation of an isolated DC-MG for residential use with a cooperative operation of the different nodes is proposed. The main criterion is to achieve a very simple design with only primary control in a residential area. This application achieves a simple system, with low implementation costs, in which each user has autonomy but benefits from the support of the other users connected to the microgrid, which improves its reliability. The description of the elements necessary to create this cooperative system is one of the contributions of the work. Another important contribution is the analysis of the operation of the microgrid as a whole, where each node can be, arbitrarily, a consumer or an energy generator. The proposed structures could promote the use of small distributed generation and energy storage systems as the basis for a new paradigm of a more sustainable electricity grid of the future.