Currently, for the determination of the suitable and optimal PV power plant according to the climate conditions of the concerned region, researchers focus on the estimation of certain performance factors, which are reported to be the key parameters for the analysis of the performances of grid-connected photovoltaic (PV) power systems. In this context, this paper focuses on on-site real-time analysis of the performance of three solar photovoltaic plants: Sidi-bel-Abbés (12 MW_p), Laghouat (60 MW_p), and Ghardaïa (1.1 MW_p). These plants are located in different regions experiencing diverse climatic conditions in Algeria. The analysis was carried out by the standardized norms of IEC 61724, using monitoring data collected over one year. The photovoltaic power plants were evaluated in terms of performance factors, such as the reference yield (Y_r), final yield (Y_f), performance ratio (PR), and capacity factor (CF). On the other side, based on real data collected at the concerned sites, two linear functions depending on solar irradiance and the PV module temperature for each site are proposed for the evaluation of the generated alternative power output (P_AC) for the three PV plants. The obtained results based on the study presented in this paper can help designers of PV power plants of different technologies and different climate conditions to precisely decide the convenient technology that allows the best production of the electrical energy for grid-tied PV systems. Furthermore, this study can contribute in giving a clear vision of the implementation of upcoming large-scale solar PV power plants in Algeria within the studied area and other areas.

During the last decade, DC microgrids have been extensively researched due to their simple structure compared to AC microgrids and increased penetration of DC loads in modern power networks. The DC microgrids consist of three main components, that is, distributed generation units (DGU), distributed non-linear load, and interconnected power lines. The main control tasks in DC microgrids are voltage stability at the point of common coupling (PCC) and current sharing among distributed loads. This paper proposes a distributed control algorithm using the higher-order multi-agent system for DC microgrids. The proposed control algorithm uses communication links between distributed multi-agents to acquire information about the neighbors’ agents and perform the desired control actions to achieve voltage balance and current sharing among distributed DC loads and DGUs. In this research work, non-linear ZIP loads and dynamical RLC lines are considered to construct the model. The dynamical model of the power lines and DGU are used to construct the control objective for each distributed DGU that is improved using the multi-agent system-based distributed current control. The closed-loop stability analysis is performed at the equilibrium points, and control gains are derived. Finally, simulations are performed using MATLAB/Simulink environment to verify the performance of the proposed control method.

With the growing interest in owning electric vehicles due to increased environmental awareness and uncertain energy security together with the development of Li-ion batteries, quietness, and trouble-free operation, it is urgent to develop charging stations that are fast enough to supply the vehicles with energy conveniently, as in case of conventional petrol stations. The main reason that hinders the spread of fast charging stations is the installation cost, comprising the infrastructure and converter costs. In this article, a multiport DC-DC converter with differential power processing stages is proposed for Electric Vehicle (EV) fast charging stations, which results in a considerable reduction in the cost of using converters while achieving high efficiency. The proposed topology consists of two paths for the power flow (outer and inner loops) for EV battery charging with main and auxiliary DC-DC converters in the outer loop; all the ports are connected in series with the main supply, where the bulk power is being transferred. The main DC-DC converter injects a series voltage to control the power in the outer loop. The auxiliary DC-DC converters are rated at a fractional power that controls the partial power supplied to each port through the inner loops. Thanks to the fractional power processed by the auxiliary converter with the remaining power fed to the battery through the main converter, the proposed architecture enables simultaneous charging of multiple electric vehicles with better efficiency, lower cost, and the capability of providing a fault tolerance feature. A PWM control scheme for the converters to achieve bi-directional power flow in the partially rated DC-DC converters is discussed for the proposed system. Moreover, a practical down-scaled hardware prototype is designed to validate the functionality, control scheme, and effectiveness of the proposed topology in different case studies being investigated. The efficiency of the proposed converter is compared to the conventional configuration.

Electric vehicles (EVs) can be charged wirelessly using inductive charging technology. This process has a number of advantages in terms of automation, safety in harsh environments, reliability in the event of natural disasters and adaptability. On the other hand, the inductive charger has many issues, including a complex design, sensitivity to misalignment, safety concerns, and a high cost. The transmitting and receiving coils are the primary causes of the cited problems. This paper presents an in-depth study of an electric vehicle charging system based on the magnetic coupling between two coils by introducing different materials to concentrate the magnetic flux and hence improving the overall efficiency of the charging system and its design. Three situations of the magnetic coupling between two identical rectangular coils as a function of both the horizontal (X axis) and vertical (Z axis) alignment are examined. In the first case, the analysis of the magnetic coupling between two copper coils separated by an air gap is presented. The results show that the magnitude of the fields decreases according to the distance between the transmitter and the receiver coils and the obtained coupling coefficient was very low with a high leakage flux which affected the performance of the charging system. In the second case, a straightforward shielding method that involves inserting a magnetic material of the ferrite type is proposed to overcome these problems. The use of ferrite magnetic shielding contributes to channeling the field lines as well as reducing leakage flux which makes the transmitted power higher. This perspective shows that simple shielding is still only a partial and insufficient solution. In the third situation, an aluminum sheet was consequently placed on the top of the ferrite to provide an adequate shielding structure. A 3D analysis of the self and mutual induction parameters separating the two coils as well as a magnetic field is also performed using the Ansys Maxwell software. The results highlight the significance of the enhanced proposed design.

This paper proposes a new multifunctional control technique for a grid-connected hybrid distributed generation system composed of a photovoltaic system and a wind power system based on a voltage source converter (VSC). Indeed, aside from the generation and the injection of energy into the grid, the proposed system deals with power quality issues caused by harmonics generated by non-linear loads in order to keep the source current uncontaminated. The VSC serves to first ensure that the power generated from the hybrid renewable energy source is fed to the utility grid and acts as a shunt active power filter in case an abnormal increase in the THD of the source current above the standard permissible values is detected due to the non-linear load connection. The two sources of the hybrid system are connected to a common DC bus to simplify the control and reduce the cost of the system, and a maximum power point tracking controller is used for both sources. The major advantage of this novel proposed multifunctional control technique is its ability to inject harvested power into the grid while simultaneously ensuring the compensation of the harmonics and reactive power. The proposed multifunctional control technique is validated through an extensive simulation analysis using MATLAB/Simulink.

Open-end winding five-phase induction motor (OeW-5PIM) configuration is used in industrial applications, where minimization in the total harmonic currents and high reliability are needed. The majority of the literature on OeW-5PIM topology discusses field-oriented control and direct torque control in addition to other robust control techniques such as the backstepping approach. This paper focuses on the mathematical and experimental approaches of backstepping control (BSC) and rotor-flux-oriented control (RFOC) for an OeW-5PIM topology. The space vector pulse width modulation (SVPWM) strategy is associated with the suggested control techniques to improve the dynamic performance (i.e., reducing ripple, fixed switching frequency, etc.) of the studied motor. Furthermore, the RFOC-SVPWM and BSC-SVPWM are comprehensively compared using experimental implementation under various situations such as load torque, open-phase fault, and high/low-speed operation.

The paper suggests a 9-level inverter with quadruple boosting which it considers very useful for small-scale PV systems. The suggested circuit uses capacitors that are a self-balanced voltage without using an additional circuit or complicated control algorithms to balance the voltage of the capacitors. The circuit produces 9 levels with quadruple boost gain at the output terminals by using minimum components as compared with other recent topologies. The circuit analysis and modeling for each output level are described. The switching control strategy uses a simplistic logic control circuit relying on Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) is implemented to ensure balance voltage of capacitors. By the help of MATLAB/SIMULINK, the effectiveness and robustness of architecture are validated. Furthermore, a prototype for this topology is set up and tested in the laboratory using a DSPACE-1104 verifying the theoretical analysis. The experimental setup and hardware implementation are described. The theoretical and experimental results are investigated under various conditions illustrating excellent agreement between the theoretical and experimental endorses the targeted circuit.

Partially impaired antenna array is one of the challenges for estimating the accurate directions of the signals impinging upon antenna arrays. It causes random loss of the signal information, resulting in the poor direction of arrival (DOA) estimation performance. In this paper, we propose an efficient DOA estimation method under partially impaired antenna array elements, which work randomly. We first devise a strategy to detect the positions of randomly lost signal information corresponding to partially impaired antenna array elements and then formulate the problem of received signal recovery as low rank matrix completion. Afterwards, we utilize the recursive least squares (RLS) with the nulling antenna array for DOA estimation due to its fast convergence and low mean square error properties and place the nulls in the directions of received signals by adjusting the weight vectors adaptively. The reciprocal of the …