Dynamic performance of a microturbine connected to a low voltage network

Abstract

Nowadays there is a great interest for the use of microturbines as sources of distributed generation, particularly in areas where demand is both electricity and heat. In these areas microturbines reach very high efficiency rates.

Microturbines can operate both stand-alone and grid connected. The second one of the mentioned possibilities is which deserves a much deeper study, to analyse the interaction of the microturbine with the distribution network it is connected to.

In this paper a dynamic model of a microturbine is developed with Matlab/Simulink/Simpowersystems. The model has been included within a low voltage network model and several dynamic simulations have been performed to study the response to step changes in the power control references. Also, the performance of the microturbine to faults in the network has been analysed.