Typhoon HIL Blog

Story Summary

• The e-mesh Control is designed for the seamless integration of renewables with traditional energy assets.
• Challenge: Ensuring that multiple e-mesh controls communicate in a coordinated way.
• Solution: Typhoon controller Hardware-in-the-Loop used to design and test e-mesh controls
• Result: Typhoon HIL accelerated e-mesh control development time and increased test coverage.
• HIL Tested means flexibility, reliability, optimized, and great performance.

Highlights

• Hitachi ABB Power Grids needs to integrate various DERs and control multiple loads in a complex system environment.

• Before HIL, Software in the Loop was used to develop control algorithms but a system using real controllers was needed to ensure the system works.
• Controller Hardware-in-the-Loop (C-HIL) gives grid flexibility and adaptability to cover many test cases at an appropriate fidelity.
• C-HIL can be used from early design phase all the way into operational performance and customer demonstration with factory acceptance testing.
• For microgrids with BESS and solar PV, the seamless transition from grid connected to islanded mode was demonstrated using C-HIL.
• “HIL Tested” for Hitachi ABB Power Grids means great performance.
  
  

Highlights

• Typhoon HIL solutions enable Hitachi ABB Power Grids to push the limits of testing product functionality to cover customer needs throughout entire product lifecycle.

• Software in the Loop supports development of individual algorithms but a higher fidelity testing environment is needed to ensure the system works as a whole.

• Controller Hardware-in-the-Loop is a combination of real hardware controllers interfaced with a real-time simulation of the power system.

• Standard models in the Typhoon HIL microgrid library helped save 4-5 months in controller development and testing.

• C-HIL technology increased test coverage in a low-cost environment which ensures great product performance and cost-savings for Hitachi ABB customers.

Highlights

• Decentralization, Decarbonization, and Digitalization are driving emerging technologies for distributed control of microgrid assets.
• Hitachi ABB e-mesh is a vertically integrated system that manages and optimizes distributed energy resources from the device-level to systems control and IoT domain.
• Microgrid control systems optimizes the flow of different assets to ensure the supply of electricity is stable and reliable.
• A football arena in Norway uses Hitachi ABB e-mesh solutions to integrate renewables in the urban community with microgrids and energy storage capabilities.
• Communication plays a key role in a distributed controls approach in which a high number of signals are transmitted and received between devices.

Story Summary

• AVL List GmbH uses Typhoon HIL test solutions in the agile development, prototyping, testing, and maintenance of firmware and hardware versions of their e-Storage BTE product portfolio.

• AVL e-Storage BTE can act as a battery tester and battery emulator for testing and validating batteries, e-motors, and inverters in early development phases.

• C-HIL reduces firmware development and testing time, and as a result speeds up the time-to market-for new features by enabling automated testing through all product variant cases.

• HIL in one word: Agile.

Energy networks worldwide are evolving to become increasingly more decentralized, fueled by new developments in many sectors: Industry 4.0, Distributed Energy Resources (DERs), electric vehicles (EVs), and more. This means greater need for robust local control and storage systems to avoid dangerous disruptions or blackouts. These factors are driving innovation, particularly in two areas: new power electronic controllers for energy storage and DERs, and new system level control architectures that can control microgrids effectively in a wider range of conditions. 

What is the challenge? 

The electric power systems are going through a transition that encompass digitalization, decentralization, and decarbonization. This will lead to more resilient power grids due to higher adoption of digital technologies, renewable power sources, and new battery storage systems. Everyone will benefit from the enhanced control, efficiency, and maintenance capabilities, but it all has to start from smart test-driven design. There is a need for integrated solutions to improve power system performance which will be data-based, so the systems are built with the end specs in mind and thoroughly tested throughout all possible test scenarios in an automated manner. 

Typhoon HIL Champion – Mr. Hashimoto from National Institute in Fukushima

National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST)

The Japanese National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology’s (AIST) Fukushima Renewable Energy Research Institute is one of the world's largest facilities for testing and evaluation of high-power power electronics converters. It’s mission and goals are similar to Sandia National Laboratories and National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) in US, and Austrian Institute of Technology (AIT) in Europe.

"One of the advantages of HIL is that it is capable of real-time simulation. This will give us confidence in our model or our algorithm before the actual implementation of the nanogrid.

 

-Dr. Nadia Mei Lin Tan, Associate Professor at UNITEN