An Application of the Multi-Port Bidirectional Three-Phase AC-DC Converter in Electric Vehicle Charging Station Microgrid

Abstract

This paper presents an application of the multi-port bidirectional three-phase ac-dc converter as interface between a microgrid composed by several power sources and an electric vehicle charging station (EVCS). The main advantage of using this converter is that it can integrate multiple power sources and loads into a single power conversion stage and thus control the power flow between them reducing the number of power conversion stages and / or devices as well as weight and volume of the entire system and the control architecture does not require communication strucure as main current solutions in this field present. The microgrid of this study was composed of a photovoltaic system, a battery energy storage system, two 48 kW fast charging units for electricle vehicles, a connection to the local grid and the multi-port bidirectional converter with minor changes to be able in this type of application with a rated power at 100 kW. Simulation results obtained from a system model are presented and discussed in order to validate that under different power sources conditions the converter operates effectively confirming the feasibility of using this type of application in EVCS microgrid technology.