Research group "Software-specified autonomous energy systems"

Duration: 1.1.2023 - 31.12.2025

Funding reference: 2022 FGR 0003

The project is funded by the Free State of Thuringia from the "European Social Fund Plus".

Motivation

Lukas Thierauf

With the use of power electronic systems, the behavior of grid voltage and grid frequency in a power supply grid is increasingly determined by their control and regulation algorithms. This is particularly true for autonomous grids, some of whose grid participants consist entirely of power electronic systems.

This is the context of the present project, which involves the Department of Power Electronics and Controls in Electrical Power Engineering as well as the Departments of Small Machines (Prof. Andreas Möckel) and Electrical Power Supply (Prof. Dirk Westermann) at Ilmenau University of Technology. The project is being carried out at the Thuringian Energy Research Institute.

The aim is to develop methods to improve the operating characteristics of autonomous grids with regard to energy management and the time response of the grid voltage under changing load scenarios. Work is being carried out in the following fields of activity:

  • Energy management in local autonomous grids,
  • Development of a real-time control and regulation system,
  • Development of a flexible modular power converter system,
  • Design of a special machine for a flywheel storage system with power branching.
 

The project is supported by an industrial advisory board.

Members of the Industrial Advisory Board

  • Aggreko Germany GmbH
  • ISLE Steuerungstechnik und Leistungselektronik GmbH
  • ELATEC GmbH
  • Neways Electronics GmbH
  • Schaeffler AG
  • Siemens Energy Global GmbH & Co. KG
  • TLU - Thüringer Leistungselektronik Union GmbH
 

Completed student projects

Danilo Hopf: Experimental validation of the model of a permanent magnet-assisted reluctance machine, Diploma thesis, 2025

Luis Müller: Method for determining and reducing the procedural error of a bandwidth reduction of measurement data for determining the conduction and switching losses of power electronic switches, Research project, 2025

Marcel Meister: Low-latency serialized data transmission for an externally connected measurement system, Master's thesis, 2024

Dominik Döge: Determination of conducted interference emissions from hard-switching three-phase power converters with intermediate voltage circuit, research project, 2024

Alexander Döge: Model-based design of a direct current control method, Master's thesis, 2024

Oliver Dahl: Implementation of a bandwidth reduction of measured values for the calculation of switching and conduction losses and simulation of the process error, Bachelor thesis, 2024

Dominik Döge: Design of a back-to-back power converter for experimental purposes, Bachelor thesis, 2024

Publications

Heidrich, T., Möckel, A.: "Simulation of a synchronous reluctance machine taking into account the processing influences on the electrical steel" in GMM-Fachbericht 111 Innovative Kleinantriebs- und Kleinmotorentechnik (IKMT 2025), 2025, IEEExplore

Halawi, N., Westermann, D., Schlegel, S., Joas, K.: "Levelized Cost of Electricity for Electric Vehicle Charging in Off-Grid Solar-Powered Microgrid: A Practical Case Study" in Energies 2025, 18, 4284, DOI: 10.3390/en18164284

Gensior, A., Dahl, O.: "Downsampling of measurement data for power electronic systems preserving information on power losses in the switching devices" in 2024 Energy Conversion Congress & Expo Europe (ECCE Europe), 2024, DOI: 10.1109/ECCEEurope62508.2024.10752008

Minakov, I., Rojas, S.: "Performance Analysis of a Communication Interface for Control and Data Visualization of Power Converters" in 2024 Energy Conversion Congress & Expo Europe (ECCE Europe), 2024, DOI: 10.1109/ECCEEurope62508.2024.10751953

Heidrich, T., Möckel, A., Fehr, H., Gensior, A.: "Permanent Magnet Assisted Synchronous Reluctance Machine for a Power-Split Flywheel Storage System" in 2024 International Conference on Electrical Machines (ICEM), 2024, DOI: 10.1109/ICEM60801.2024.10700276

Schlegel, St., Westermann, D., Gensior, A.: "Data of an autonomous microgrid with just EV load and PV generation" - Measurement data set for the period 1.7.2023 to 31.12.2023, 2024, DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.10640798

Fehr, H., Gensior, A., Heidrich, T., Möckel, A.: "Comparison of two flywheel concepts for the support of microgrids" in 25th European Conference on Power Electronics and Applications (EPE'23 ECCE Europe), 2023, DOI: 10.23919/EPE23ECCEEurope58414.2023.10264566

 

Public visibility

Comparison of TCP and UDP for data exchange between a power electronic system and a host PC for a human-machine interface - Contribution to the ISLE Seminar 2024, 29.11.2024

Software-specified autonomous energy systems - Presentation of the research group at the annual conference of the Thuringian research groups 2024, 6.6.2024

Transport Protocol for Control and Data Visualization" - Contribution at Energia Connecticum 2024: Solar fuel production - hydrogen, CO2 reduction and artificial photosynthesis, 10.4.2024

Research group SOFIE - "Software-specified autonomous energy systems" - Contribution at Energia Connecticum 2023: Grids of the future, 10.3.2023

Article in the newsletterEIKOMPAKT, issue II 2023