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Although PV systems are one of the most widely used alternatives as a renewable energy source due to their well-known advantages, there are significant challenges to address related to voltage fluctuations and reverse power flow caused by high PV penetration scenarios. As a potential solution to this problem, an active power management strategy is proposed in this work using a residential cluster as a benchmark. The proposed strategy is analyzed and experimentally verified, offering a simple way to reduce the voltage fluctuations by regulating the active power delivered by the PV system, achieving also relevant functionalities for the system, such as the regulation of the DC bus voltage, maximum power point tracking (MPPT), synchronization with the grid voltage, detection of high penetration conditions, and a simple strategy for the main controller with an effective performance. The proposal system shows satisfactory results being able to maintain grid voltage fluctuations within the voltage standard specifications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A three-port converter suitable for standalone applications is proposed in this paper. Each port is used for specific input or output, and its functions depend on the port; they are the renewable source, the battery set, and the output port. This proposed converter is considered for standalone operation, but it is not limited to it. Not only the system is able to deliver energy independently from each input source or in a mixed way for the output, but also the battery system may be charged from the renewable source just in case it is required. The battery port is only used when it is required; this allows increasing battery lifetime. Another important feature is that, in case of a renewable source failure, the energy is automatically demanded from the battery set, like an uninterruptible power supply. The system is able to track the maximum power of the renewable source when it is required. Operation, analysis, simulation, and experimental results are described in detail. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]