Smart Control validation. The validation of the Smart Controller was held operating La Plana hybrid facility in real conditions, under a simulated demand and with the high-level and low-level controls cooperating to achieve the objectives of the control. The experiments related to the validation of the control were done along September and October (some other tests were done to test the communications). There is a limitation for these tests related to the weather conditions, as the significant tests have to include both wind turbine and PV plant. As explained in the introduction of this section, the TSC program has been modified to make possible the coordinated operation of the Predictive and Optimal Control with the local control. Once the optimal profiles for generated power and SOC are calculated it is necessary that the local controller follow these set-points. As the actual generated power in every plant depends on the weather conditions it is not possible to base the interactions between both controls on the generated power in the plants. So, it will be the desired SOC the only set-point that the power plant has to follow. In this way it is always guaranteed, according to the predictions, that there will always be enough energy available to fulfil the objectives even though when the generated power is low. In the same way when the energy stored is used it is guaranteed that it won’t be needed in the short term or is really used to help in the maximization/minimization of the objective. The defined strategy is based on the double requirement of: • The low level control needs to apply the grid codes in real-time. This means that it needs to control the actual power of the plants to maintain the required power at the PCC even though the weather conditions such as wind gusts or clouds can change the available power in a few seconds. The power of the plants (and in some cases the power exchange with the grid) offer enough degrees of freedom to the low level controller to perform the real time control. • The long term operation of the plant follows the optimal profiles trends and achieves the programmed objective. In this sense it is important to note that the SOC desired profile is calculated using the predicted average power per hour in the plants. It is expected that the average of the actual power (or the total energy) per hour will be the same of the predicted value. So even though in the real-time operation there are changes in the available power (associated to the changes i...
