The electric vehicle, charging infrastructure and smartgrid sectors are experiencing great technical development and market penetration increasing the needs for power tests in R&D, prototype validation and production. Test platforms are increasingly complex and require both alternating and continuous bidirectional tests: absorbing energy from the network and injecting it. The equipment under test combines more and more functionalities: battery charging and discharging, injection into the electrical grid, island operation, hybridization with photovoltaics, vehicle to grid…. To respond to these needs, CINERGIA has designed a range of products that highlights the flexibility of the hardware, the adaptability to specific applications and its interface software, developed by engineers for engineers in order to satisfy the most complex tests intuitively.
hardware flexibility
CINERGIA's power platform is based on an IGBT back-to-back regenerative converter. The input three-phase active filter allows current consumption, or injection, meeting the strictest quality requirements with a THDi of less than 3% and a power factor close to unity. For those applications that require reactive power control, for example, to support the network, the equipment supports the selection of the desired reactive level. The output converter, three branches of IGBTs, is configured and controlled differently depending on the model: 4Q AC voltage source (single-phase or three-phase), 4Q AC current source (single-phase or three-phase) or bidirectional buck/boost in DC. The robustness of this control platform, developed to work 24/7, makes it possible to use it in the most demanding applications.
Cinergia Equipment Structure
The flexibility of CINERGIA equipment, unique in the market, is undoubtedly due to the control platform and firmware, fully developed by the R&D team, which makes the most of the hardware. Based on digital signal processors, DSP, in 2018 the control platform was redesigned, replacing fixed point DSPs with floating point DSPs and greater computing power, allowing a significant technological leap. The measurement of control signals is carried out by means of an oversampling of 16 samples per control cycle, which allows working with a high resolution and, at the same time, a very low noise level. Thanks to this, the control loops have been adjusted and optimized, allowing transients of less than a millisecond in the entire power range, from 7.5 to 200kVA.
interface software
The user can take full advantage of the flexibility of the equipment thanks to the HMI interface, made up of an embedded PC, in the CINERGIA equipment, and a software application developed by our engineers and improved based on the experience and feedback of the users. users. Remote control is carried out using an open and documented protocol based on MODBUS TCP. The interface software application has been updated and improved in 2019 with the STEPS function through which the tests, programmed in steps, are executed in the equipment's DSP, allowing highly precise and deterministic tests. In addition, the latest version of STEPS incorporates preconfigured Low Voltage Ride Through (LVRT) and IEC 61000-4-11 (voltage dips), 4-13 (harmonics), 4-14 (voltage fluctuations) and 4-28 (voltage fluctuations) tests. power fluctuations).
Adaptability
This combination of power platform, control hardware and firmware, and interface software constitutes the CINERGIA PLUS range which, in a unique way, is offered in different models to adapt to the needs of each test: • 1-function equipment : This is equipment optimized to work only as a 4Q AC voltage source (GE+) or as a 4Q AC current source (EL+) or as a bidirectional DC source (B2C+). These equipments are the most competitive solution for test platforms with very well defined needs.
- Devices that combine 2 functions: these are devices that offer two functions in a single hardware: GE+ vAC/DC (combining a GE+ and a B2C+), EL+ vAC/DC (combining an EL+ and a B2C+) and the GE/EL+ vAC (combining a GE+ and an EL+). These devices are the ideal solution for platforms that do not have different needs at the same time.
- The complete “all in one” GE/EL vAC/DC unit that combines in a single unit all the functions of the CINERGIA product catalogue: GE+, EL+ and B2C+. This equipment, unique in the market, is the perfect solution for those laboratories that seek the greatest flexibility in their current and future tests.
Power Hardware in the Loop and Open Converter
The field of academic research is one of the most important for CINERGIA, thanks to the continuous collaboration with teams of researchers and the participation in a large number of projects. For this reason, specific equipment has been developed for this field:
- Power Hardware in the Loop (PHIL): in these applications, the source behaves like a Power Amplifier connected to a real-time control system (RTCS), converting the setpoint analog signals into AC voltage signals. , AC or DC current depending on the model.
- Open Converter: in these applications, the real-time control system controls the converter at a low level, sending PWM commands and directly receiving analog voltage and current readings from the converter. The control system, therefore, is carried out in the RTCS and not in the CINERGIA control platform, which is replaced by a signal adaptation card and hardware level protection.
