Ecogeneration cover the mission of the DERlab

Dull or extraordinary grid conditions can be conjured to stress test clean energy equipment at the ANU’s laboratory dedicated to distributed energy resources.

After three years in development the Australian National University’s DERlab – a laboratory where distributed energy resources can be stuck together in any combination and bossed about by curious engineers – is open to researchers and technology developers around the country.

“It’s a stepping stone between research and development and the live network,” says ANU battery storage and grid integration program research leader Bjorn Sturmberg.

The lab is set up as a failsafe environment that replicates a distribution network. Up to six DER devices – solar, batteries, EVs, smart air-conditioners, programmable loads, etc – can be included on each of the three connection points to replicate a street in the NEM. That little world can then be forced to endure gruesome grid conditions limited only by the lab technicians’ imaginations.

“One of the challenges of moving to a more distributed energy is that we need millions of devices to interact in a coordinated sensible manner, and we can test those things in the lab,” Sturmberg says.

The “street” can be powered by mains power or using an amplifier that can create different types of voltage waveform, so that frequency, power quality, voltage magnitude and other variables can be wound up and down. “That’s what really allows you to simulate any kind of grid conditions.”

The lab also includes a data acquisition system developed at ANU that can perform around 60,000 times faster than most smart meters, capable of recording waveforms of the power system. “That’s the single source of truth,” Sturmberg says, that allows researchers a fine-grained view of the results of an experiment.

Full story here: https://www.ecogeneration.com.au/to-the-limit-anu-lab-open-for-extreme-or-mundane-der-testing