Converting an Old Machines Lab Into a Functioning Power Network With a Microgrid for Education

As colleges prepare or revise their power engineering courses to include discussions on the smart grid, the microgrid, distributed energy sources and renewable energy resources, the need for new material suitable for inclusion in a typical 4-year undergraduate engineering course has never been more obvious. Toward this effort, an old machines lab was remodelled and converted into a small power network that can be operated in both grid-connected and grid-islanded microgrid modes. The intent of this paper is to devise laboratory experiments to supplement a course in conventional power systems analysis at the undergraduate level. During the remodeling process, two of six synchronous machines in the lab were converted to represent distributed generating units within a laboratory-based microgrid. The use of electromechanical distributed generators (EDG) with a low start-up time allows the system to operate as a conventional power network with provisions for frequency and voltage variations. Students can experiment with voltage control and power sharing between the EDGs in islanded mode. A Laboratory Grid Central Controller (LGCC) was developed in LabVIEW® to coordinate the operation of the EDGs, the utility grid and the loads. Its functions are similar to those of a central dispatch office, albeit on a much smaller scale. A one credit hour lab course held on this laboratory was offered for the first time during the Fall semester of 2012 at Missouri S&T.