Renewable Energy Testing

The energy infrastructure is changing in the automotive industry. Vehicle electrification creates significant charging demands on the grid. These changes are expanding the opportunity for energy storage with vehicle-to-grid (V2G) power applications. Variable renewable energy (VRE) and distributed energy resources (DERs) in the form of solar, wind, and battery storage are ubiquitous in global grid modernization initiatives to help meet the increased demand.

The evolution and increased complexity of the grid create significant test challenges for electric vehicle / electric vehicle supply equipment (EV / EVSE) charging and grid-edge applications. Keysight offers breakthrough grid simulation and AC / DC emulation test solutions to help your renewable energy innovations get to market faster, more safely.

Lower Cost of Test with Regenerative Power

Today's electric vehicles use 300 V to 800 V batteries. These high voltages bring higher costs and risks. Regenerative power provides a better way to test automotive batteries and their bidirectional electronics, with three benefits: heat reduction, simplified testing, and minimized rack space. The Keysight EV1003A power converter test solution for testing EV and hybrid electric vehicles (HEV) power conversion uses regenerative power to help you reduce cooling and electricity costs.

With sourcing (power supply) and sinking (electronic load) up to 2000 V, up to ±800 A, and up to 20 kW, it is the only commercial-off-the-shelf regenerative power system with integrated safety features that protect the devices under test and the engineers running the tests.

High-Power Grid-Edge Testing

Renewable Energy Ecosystem Testing

Emulating High-Power AC 

DERs are small-scale electricity supply or demand resources that are interconnected to the electric grid. Battery energy storage systems (BESS) in the DER store excess energy for use as needed. In the past, power flowed in one direction; today, it flows both ways with the help of advanced power converters and inverters. Highly digitized smart grids manage and optimize the energy distribution. Proper testing of converters and inverters in the power grid is necessary to ensure safety and performance for inverters, converters, controllers, and interconnections across complex DER networks. 

Keysight’s SL1200A Series Scienlab regenerative three-phase AC emulator handles up to 1,200 voltage alternating current (VAC). The emulator allows for a high voltage ride through (HVRT) testing without needing a large, complex test setup.

Simulating Photovoltaic Arrays

What is MPPT, and how can you test MPPT algorithms?

Maximum power point tracking (MPPT) is a technique to ensure a solar inverter operates at its maximum power point as often as possible, despite varying weather conditions. 

Developing and verifying the performance of MPPT algorithms and circuits used in inverters is challenging because MPPT algorithms are complex. Under-the-sun testing with varying temperatures and irradiance conditions gets complicated and expensive, if at all possible.

As inverters increase in power, the size of the test array becomes unmanageable. The  greater number of inputs on a single inverter drives an exponential increase in test complexity. A laboratory test solution that can simulate one-to-many real-world solar array strings is the only practical test method to overcome this challenge.

Solar Energy Renewable Energy Test Solutions

Keysight is here to accelerate your energy innovation.