Charging Manager DDF – Brief Description

The Charging Manager is a DDF for dynamic load distribution in EV charging parks with up to 16 charging points. To achieve this, the Charging Manager continuously monitors the current grid consumption and the charging demand of connected vehicles. If the configured power limit of the grid connection is reached, the Charging Manager reduces the maximum allowable charging power of individual charging points and distributes the available power across active charging points using the fair-share principle. An integrated soft start ensures that power changes occur slowly and gently, and that the communication limits of the respective charging stations are observed.

The Charging Manager operates with two power limits:

• P_SOFT: Control threshold of the grid connection. The Charging Manager regulates the entire charging park to this value using a PI controller.
• P_HARD: Maximum power limit of the grid connection. When this value is reached or exceeded, the charging power of the charging park is immediately reduced to protect the connection fuse.

Configuration

Charging park-specific data is stored via a JSON configuration. For each charging point, the minimum and maximum charging power are defined:

• P_MIN_CPx: Minimum charging power of the charging point
• P_MAX_CPx: Maximum charging power of the charging point

If a minimum power of 0 kW is entered for a charging point, the Charging Manager may pause the charging session if needed. If pausing is not desired, a minimum power greater than 0 kW must be configured.

Note: Please be aware that not all wallbox manufacturers support permanent pausing.

Additionally, the device "Charging Manager" must be created in the myGEKKO OS. The control parameters are configured there:

• P_SOFT (desired maximum connection power)
• P_HARD (absolute power limit)
• Controller parameters P and I component
• Dead zone T (minimum difference between grid consumption setpoint/actual value to activate the Charging Manager)
• Power ramp (step size of charging power changes)

Sensible default values are pre-configured. If needed, the control behavior can be adjusted: A higher P component leads to a faster response to load changes, while the I component compensates for remaining control deviations.

Integration

For commissioning, the following data points are linked in the IO configuration of the "Device Charging Manager" and "E-Mobility" systems:

Inputs

• CPS_1 to CPS_16 (DI – link the status of the charging points from the respective DDFs of the charging stations)
• P_IST_NETZ (AI – link the current grid consumption)

Outputs

• P_CP1 to P_CP16 (AO – maximum charging power per charging point released by the Charging Manager. This must be linked in the E-Mobility system under Parameters > Charging Power Limit)