State-of-charge (SOC)-balancing control of a battery energy storage system based on a cascade PWM converter

Renewable energy sources such as wind turbine generators and photovoltaics produce fluctuating electric power. The fluctuating power can be compensated by installing an energy storage system in the vicinity of these sources. This paper describes a 6.6-kV battery energy storage system based on a cascade pulsewidth-modulation (PWM) converter with focus on a control method for state-of-charge (SOC) balancing of the battery units. A 200-V, 10-kW, 3.6-kWh (13-M J) laboratory system combining a cascade PWM converter with nine nickel metal hydride (NiMH) battery units is designed, constructed, and tested to verify the validity and effectiveness of the proposed balancing control. Index Terms--Active-power control, battery energy storage system (BESS), cascade converter, nickel metal hydride (NiMH) battery, state-of-charge (SOC) balancing.