A universal controller for distributed control of power electronics systems in electric ships

This paper presents a distributed control system architecture for power electronics conversion systems. Control partitioning is explored under this scheme by analyzing spatial, temporal, and functional aspects of a family of power converters, finally proposing a two level control hierarchy. Specifically, a hardware manager-controlling the actual power conversion process, and an application manager, hardware independent universal controller are introduced and implemented. A detailed description of these controllers is given using a voltage-source inverter as test system. Additionally, a high-speed real-time protocol (PESNet) is introduced for communication purposes of the proposed distributed control architecture. From the analysis presented the usage of such an architecture and controllers for reconfigurable zonal distribution systems becomes apparent.