IIT Guwahati develops new power distribution approach for EV charging stations

Researchers at Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Guwahati have developed an optimization-based voltage control approach for active power distribution networks that can enable coordinated operation of photovolitaic (PV) power generation and electric vehicle (EV) charging stations.

“Electric vehicles are being increasingly considered the solution to carbon emissions from the transportation sector. The sustainability of EV can be enhanced if the power used to charge these vehicles is also based on renewable energy sources such as solar energy. However, solar energy is intermittent, which leads to voltage fluctuation problems in the power distribution networks. Furthermore, EV charging is uncoordinated at present, which leads to under-voltage of the distribution networks, and associated efficiency loss,” IIT Guwahati said.

“A coordinated control approach for power distribution system is required in order to derive maximum benefits from renewable power generation and electric vehicle power sourcing. PV and EV inverters need to work in coordination with other Voltage Regulating Devices (VRD) to regulate the system voltages,” it added.

Dr Sanjib Ganguly, Associate Professor at Department of Electronics and Electrical Engineering (EEE) along with his research scholar Arunima Dutta and collegue Dr. Chandan Kumar, have published their research in the journal of Sustainable Energy, Grids and Networks.

Highlighting his research, Dr. Ganguly said, “We have developed an optimization-based coordinated voltage control approach of power distribution networks to mitigate the overvoltage and under-voltage problems due to high PV generation and high EV charging, respectively”.