Power Hardware-in-the-loop Interfacing via $\mathcal{H}_\infty$ Model Matching

TL;DR

This paper introduces an $ ext{H}_ extinfty$ model matching control method for power hardware-in-the-loop interfacing, aiming to enhance accuracy and stability by utilizing all available dynamical information in the system.

Contribution

It proposes a novel $ ext{H}_ extinfty$ model matching approach that explicitly optimizes transparency, improving accuracy and stability in PHIL interfaces over traditional methods.

Findings

Achieves accuracy comparable or superior to ideal transformer method

Demonstrates stability and transparency in real-time PHIL setup

Validates approach through experimental results

Abstract

This paper presents an $\mathcal{H}_\infty$ model matching control-based approach to the problem of power hardware-in-the-loop (PHIL) interfacing. The objective is to interconnect a grid simulation and a physical device via an interface in a way that is stable and accurate. Conventional approaches include the ideal transformer method (ITM) and its impedance-based variants, which trade accuracy for stability, as well as some $\mathcal{H}_\infty$ control-based approaches, which do not make use of all the available information in their optimization for accuracy. Designing for transparency, as opposed to accuracy as existing approaches do, would achieve both accuracy and stability, while making use of all the dynamical information present in the idealized interconnection of the grid and device. The approach proposed in this paper employs model matching to formulate the PHIL problem as an $\mathcal{H}_\infty$ control problem using transparency as the explicit frequency-domain control objective. The approach is experimentally validated in a real-time resistive-load PHIL setup, and is found to achieve accuracy levels that are comparable or superior to those of an ITM-based interface.