Trianon Renewable Grid Stability (Trianon Grid) has secured certain U.S. rights to a patented and proprietary control algorithm software that can be integrated with the control software for virtually any conventional three-phase electric power inverter to transform that inverter, without making any modifications to its hardware, into a “synchronverter.”
By utilizing synchronverters instead of conventional power inverters, a renewable energy generating facility (whether it is a small rooftop system, a utility scale project, an energy storage system or a discharging electric vehicle) will appear to the grid to be transformed from asynchronous to synchronous and based on continuous feedback from the grid, provide, within a single cycle, the following optimized grid stability services: voltage support with reactive power; frequency support with active power; and synthetic inertia – the critical grid stability service being lost as large fossil plants are retired.
Trianon Grid has secured exclusive marketing rights to the technology in the U.S. from Synvertec, Ltd, a firm located in Israel, believes that the widescale adoption of synchronverters represents a major step in enabling a paradigm shift in the efficient management of electrical grid stability in the U.S. and ultimately the achievement of an entirely renewable energy grid. Trianon Grid is seeking to arrange manufacturing licenses with inverter suppliers focusing on the U.S. market who wish to convert their power inverters into synchronverters.
Historically, the electrical grid in the U.S. has been supplied by large, synchronous, fossil-fuel powered generation facilities. Consequently, today’s grid control and management strategies are largely based on the electrical properties of these large fossil-fueled rotating machines. In the case of renewable energy generators, like wind and solar, the focus in the operation of such generators, has been to maximize the injection of power from the generator into the grid. This focus works well when renewable sources constitute a small part of grid capacity and the power fluctuations associated with renewables can be compensated by conventional generators.
Now, the ever-increasing demand to add both large-scale and distributed renewable energy generation facilities to the grid is putting increasingly significant stress on grid stability and causing utilities and grid operators to look for alternative solutions to their reliance on conventional generators. Today, such solutions rely largely on current inverter technology using “rule of thumb” setpoints (whether programmed into the inverter or received via communication from grid operators), curtailment of renewable generation and capital-intensive energy storage facilities or the continued use of fossil-fuel generators. With the introduction of the synchronverter, a more efficient and less costly solution -- in the form of a new generation of power inverters that can provide faster, more precise stability services to the grid, specifically synthetic inertia, voltage support and dynamic frequency response -- is available.
While the promise of synchronverters has long been recognized as a possibility, Synvertec is the first technology solution to realize this promise. The software solution developed by Synvertec, converting conventional inverters into synchronverters without any hardware modifications, is the lowest cost solution to maximize the penetration of renewable energy resources while simultaneously contributing to electric grid stability and represents a revolutionary shift in grid control and management strategies.
Converting a conventional inverter into a synchronverter creates a cutting-edge electrical device with very rapid and precise response capability by incorporating a patented, proprietary control algorithm for synchronous power supply and enhanced grid stabilization. The Synvertec control algorithm can be integrated seamlessly with virtually all conventional three-phase inverters.
Synchronverters mimic the local control loops in a manner similar to that of a synchronous generator providing active and reactive power source participation in grid stabilization, but significantly faster and more effective. If all renewable generators were outfitted with synchronverters, each would, unless overridden by a command from the grid operator, at the point of common coupling, continuously monitor the condition of the grid and instantaneously adjust its output (within each cycle) to meet the frequency and voltage requirements of the grid.
In any given moment, the control algorithm computes the induced voltages on the stator windings of the inverter (from the currents, the angular position and the angular velocity), without any lags or tracking errors. The system allows for the unprecedented regulation of the active and reactive power fed to the grid. The droop coefficients, or more complicated non-linear droop curves, are imposed easily by the software of the Synvertec processor (which can also respond to demands from the grid operator). The solution is highly scalable, with the synchronverter able to control inverters ranging in size from kW to MW. Perhaps most importantly, the Synvertec synchronverter can provide synthetic inertia to the grid within a single cycle.
