FUTURE UNIFIED DC RAILWAY ELECTRIFICATION SYSTEM

About FUNDRES

Scope

The challenge for the railway sector regarding energy is to increase the capacity while improving the energy consumption and limiting the environmental impacts, and to decrease the investment and exploitation costs, while maintaining safety and service quality. It makes it necessary to rethink railway power supply under future requests, reflecting the status of different systems. 

 

Facts and Figures

  • Topic: Future traction power supply for railways and public transport
  • EU Contributions: 750 000€
  • Duration: 24 months
  • Project start date: 01/12/2019
  • Project end date: 30/11/2021
  • Partners: 4 partners from 3 countries
  • Project coordinator: INSTITUT NATIONAL POLYTECHNIQUE DE TOULOUSE (LAPLACE)
  • H2020-S2RJU-OC-2019
  • Grant agreement n° 881772

The project FUNDRES presents a deep thinking and related work to define the future of railway, based on new unified Future UNified Dc Railway Electrification System based on 9 kvDC, able to integrate the existing lines during transition period. In the coming years, MVDC power grids will contribute to the deployment of renewable energies and the electrification of transport systems. Compared to classical AC electricity distribution networks, they are generally more energy efficient and facilitate the interconnection of sources, storage elements and loads. In 2018, a new 9 kV DC railway electrification system is presented as an opportunity for railway sector. The ambitions of FUNDRES are to bring substantial improvements in the energy technology area and station for the future unified system based on 9 kVDC. The consortium composed by LAPLACE, EPFL, POLIMI and UIC will develop several scenarios, validated by experimental demonstration at the laboratory level. The digital twin offers the possibility to predict the behaviour and the impacts of the proposed unified electrical system based on 9kvDC.

The project outputs will be used to deliver new integrated technology demonstrators and scientific progress for the project IN2STEMPO, and more largely for Shift2Rail, which will be implemented in the railway network.

 

Objectives

The main objectives of the FUNDRES project is to:

  • Quantify potential impact of the increase in voltage levels in DC railway electrification;
  • Explore suitable power supply schemes and impact of power electronics and energy storage technologies, as well as interactions with 3-phase utility grids in ancillary service markets;
  • Deliver modelling tools to simulate all relevant scenarios and to implement Digital Twins, both at equipment level and system level;
  • Set up representative experimental demonstration to evaluate performances of the future DC system, focusing on 9kVdc as an example;
  • Give recommendations for the new future unified DC railway power supply to the project’s advisory group, to the members of Shift2rail’s Innovation Programme n°3, to standardisation committees.

Project structure

WP NumberWP TitleLead beneficiary
WP1Project ManagementINSTITUT NATIONAL POLYTECHNIQUE DE TOULOUSE (LAPLACE)
WP2Grid interaction Railway power supply and public gridECOLE POLYTECHNIQUE FEDERALE DE LAUSANNE (EPFL)
WP3Integration of renewable sources, storage systems and charging infrastructures in 9 kVDC railway systemPOLITECNICO DI MILANO (POLIMI)
WP4Solid State TransformerINSTITUT NATIONAL POLYTECHNIQUE DE TOULOUSE (LAPLACE)
WP5Communication, dissemination and link with other projects of S2RUNION INTERNATIONALE DES CHEMINS DE FER (UIC)

Consortium

The Institut National Polytechnique de Toulouse (LAPLACE) is the leading French research centre in the field of electrical engineering and plasma with 160 full-time researchers and a similar number of doctoral and post-doctoral students.

In the field of power converters, the “Static Converters” group of LAPLACE conducts research on new architectures with a preferred direction towards medium and high-power applications. The main investigations concern original concepts of combinations of interleaved switching cells, which can be superimposed and/or magnetically coupled in parallel, giving rise to innovative topologies.

LAPLACE coordinates the project,  leads WP4 related to Solid State Transformer and will provide support to EPFL in WP2 for experimental demonstration.

Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) is one of the two Swiss Federal Institutes of Technology. The research interests of the Power Electronics Laboratory are in the broad area of the Electrical Energy Generation, Conversion and Storage.

Objectives in connection with the project

With strong background in design optimization of high-power electronics converters, main objective of Power Electronics Laboratory is to develop and demonstrate highly flexible conversion structures that can support development of 9kV power distribution networks for railway sector as well as their interaction with public utility grids.

In FUNDRES EPFL will:

  • Develop a representative demonstrator of a AC-DC converter for interconnection to 9kVDC lines to public AC grids.
  • Demonstrate performances of the new technology under realistic operating conditions.
  • Establish a demonstration test platform to verify developments from other work packages.
  • Demonstrate system level gain of proposed 9kV lines in relation to surrounding AC and DC networks and integration of renewable energy sources and energy storage technologies. 

    Politecnico di Milano (POLIMI) is one of the leading science and technology Universities in Europe.

    At the Department of Mechanical Engineering, the “Electrical Drives and Power Electronics” research group carries out research on power electronics for industrial and railways applications and their interaction with the infrastructure. At the Department of Energy, the research activities of the Electrical Systems for Transportation team include technologies for sustainable urban and long-distance mobility of passenger and goods.

    The main activity of the WP3 is the modeling and simulation of the proposed system in different operating conditions. Many interactions with the other Work Packages will be necessary to define the structures and the control strategies of the various AC/DC and DC/DC converters with or without galvanic insulation. Different levels of accuracy for the entire system will be proposed: low, mid and high levels.

    UIC - International union of railwaysThe International union of railways (UIC) is the worldwide organisation for international cooperation among railways and promotion of rail transport at a global level. It gathers 200 members, among them railways, rail operators, infrastructure managers, etc. The mission of the association is to promote rail transport at world level with the objective of optimally meeting current and future challenges of mobility and sustainable development. 

    The project is managed by the UIC Rail System Department and UIC is leading the work package on communication and dissemination (WP5).

    Documents and downloads

    thumbnail of FUNDRES_flyer_Final

    FUNDRES flyer

    thumbnail of S2R Innovation Days-FUNDRES

    FUNDRES presentation

    thumbnail of FUNDRES_newsletter_202102

    FUNDRES newsletter February 2021



    Rail Event - Characterization of a 300 kW isolated DC/DC converter using 3.3 kV Sic-MOSFETs



    Scientific papers

    The solid state transformer – an essential device in the evolution of DC railway electrification systems

    Published in Power & Beyond, the Platform for Power Electronics Author: Philippe Ladoux / Editor: Nicole Kareta

    Adapting Digital Twin Technology in Electric Railway Power Systems

    Publisher: IEEE Authors: M. Ahmadi, H. J. Kaleybar, M. Brenna, F. Castelli-Dezza and M. S. Carmeli

    A resonant DC/DC converter with high efficiency and power

    Published in Power & Beyond, the Platform for Power Electronics Author: Gustavo Fortes / Editor: Nicole Kareta

    Flexible and Efficient MMC Digital Twin Realized With Small-Scale Real-Time Simulators

    Published in: IEEE Power Electronics Magazine (Volume: 8, Issue: 2, June 2021) Authors: Stefan Milovanovic, Ignacio Polanco, Milan Utvic, and Drazen Dujic

    Deliverables

    WP NoDel Rel. NoTitleDescriptionLead beneficiaryNatureDissemination LevelEst. Del. Date
    (annex I)
    WP1D1.1Quality assurance systemthe D1.1 will contain:
    • all guidelines, templates and instructions for delivering documents, demonstrator and dissemination support for the project;
    • all description of KPI to evaluate the technical progress of project and verification sheets for proper evaluation of project quality.
    LAPLACEReportConfidential, only for members of the consortium (including the Commission Services)31 Jan 2020
    WP1D1.2Project management plan and risk managementD1.2 will give all information’s about the description of work with specific tasks and subtasks allocation, detailed budget specification, deliverable preparation plan, detailed Gantt diagram (at sub task level), risk management and change management processes. The risk management plan will also set up and updated every six months.LAPLACEReportConfidential, only for members of the consortium (including the Commission Services)29 Feb 2020
    WP2D2.1Digital Twinthe D2.1 will contain the description of scenarios, adequate control algorithms which have been developed to estimate the performance of the global system, the selection of validated scenario for the experimental development, all modules to predict in several configurations the performance of future unified Dc Railway Electrification SystemEPFLDemonstratorConfidential, only for members of the consortium (including the Commission Services)31 May 2021
    WP2D2.2Review of experimental demonstration at laboratory scalethe D2.2 will contain the description of tests, the results obtained recommendation for implementationEPFLDemonstratorPublic31 Jul 2021
    WP3D3.1Digital twin for integration of renewable sources, storage systems and charging infrastructures in 9 kVDC railway systemthe D3.1 will contain:
    • the description of scenarios including the uses of renewable resources;
    • the models to predict and simulate the behaviour and performance of selected scenario;
    • Some elements that could be useful for the Digital Twin developed in WP2.
    POLIMIReportConfidential, only for members of the consortium (including the Commission Services)30 Sep 2021
    WP3D3.2Digital twin demonstrationDemonstrator of the digital twin able to consider renewable ressources, storage systems and charging infrastructures in the overall modeling of 9kVDC network.POLIMIDemonstratorPublic30 Sep 2021
    WP4D4.1Report on the specifications and the guidelines to integrate the SST into the railway infrastructurethe D4.1 will contain the electrical model developed, recommendations for the future development and for renovation of energy power supply (with the exploitation of existing infrastructures)LAPLACEReportConfidential, only for members of the consortium (including the Commission Services)30 Sep 2021
    WP5D5.1Dissemination, Communication and Exploitation Plan

    The Dissemination Plan will include a detailed action plan for reaching the target audiences. It will focus on time planning of the various activities in this WP and on defining communication strategies in order to maximize the impact of the FUNDRES dissemination. It will be elaborated for M5 and will be updated on M12 and M24.UICReportPublic30 Apr 2021
    WP5D5.2Final Dissemination, Communication and Exploitation Report

    This document will present the outcomes of the dissemination and communication activities (material produced, list of dissemination actions, audiences reached), roadmap for the FUNDRES technologies.UICReportPublic30 Nov 2021

    News & Events

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    Contacts

    Project coordinator:
    Mr. Philippe LADOUX – LAPLACE
       

    Dissemination:
    Ms. Christine HASSOUN – UIC

    This project has received funding from the Shift2Rail Joint Undertaking under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement no. 881772 (FUNDRES)

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