The Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas (MoPNG), Government of India set up The Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Petroleum Technology (RGIPT) through an Act of Parliament (RGIPT Act 2007).
The Ministry
of Petroleum and Natural Gas (MoPNG), Government of India set up The Rajiv
Gandhi Institute of Petroleum Technology (RGIPT) through an Act of Parliament
(RGIPT Act 2007). Under the privileged guidance and association, Energy
Institute, Bengaluru (EIB), Centre of Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Petroleum
Technology is operating since 2018 in transit campus in Bengaluru.
The
institute is set-up with the mission to create a dynamic state-of-the-art
learning and working environment, where intellectual ideas are nurtured and new
ideas creatively flourish, from which will emerge research scholars and
graduates, with the ability to be the leaders and innovators of tomorrow.
Under the
same vision Ecosense installed Renewable Energy Lab in November 2022.
The lab
consists of the following equipments:
Solar PV
Training and Research system is a compact miniaturised version of an actual
Solar PV standalone power plant. The system enables user to study wiring and
interconnections of different components involved in the system to develop
basic understanding of working and operation of a Standalone PV system. Through
the help of experiments a student can understand underlying principles of solar
PV, its applications in standalone system and challenges like sizing of system,
MPPT, installations etc. by doing various experiments. The system also provides
scope for further research.
Solar PV
Grid Tied Training System is a compact version of an actual Solar PV Grid Tied
power plant. The system enables user to study wiring and interconnections of
different components involved in the system to develop basic understanding of
working and operation of a Grid connected system. A user can understand
underlying principles power electronics, its applications in power system and
challenges like harmonics and grid synchronisation by doing various
experiments. The system also provides scope for further research.
Solar
Thermal Training System is a small model of real time water heating system and
can be used for the characterization and different heat transfer analysis.
Different aspects like efficiency, overall heat loss coefficient and heat
removal factor and their corresponding calculations can be demonstrated with
the help of this system. Special feature of this system is to perform
experiments with different wind speeds, different fluid temperatures and
different flow speeds.
5. Solar
Concentrator Training System
The Solar
Concentrator Training System is a compact and miniaturized version of Solar
parabolic trough collector-based water heating system. The system consists of
parabolic reflectors, absorber tube, sun tracker, piping, storage tanks and a
heat exchanger. A control panel would control different devices and also
measure the different parameters of the system. The system can be used to
perform experiments on heat transfer, parabolic trough characteristics and heat
loss at different parts of the system. The system is highly flexible – it can
be used with different working fluids, different absorbing materials, different
piping insulation thickness and different types of storage tanks. This gives a
lot of scope for research in heat transfer and related fields. Wind speed
variation and flow velocity are other parameters which can be changed to show
their impact on heat transfer and heat loss.
An ETC
characterization system for thermal analysis of fluids is a mini closed-loop
Evacuated Tube Collector system to study the thermal characteristics of various
fluids. The system uses an artificial sunlight source to illuminate evacuated
tube collector so that it can be used inside a lab and is independent of the
natural climate. The system includes header storage tank, ETC tubes and a pump
which make it suitable for the system analysis and evaluation of thermal
characteristics. Different sensors such as pressure, temperature, flow etc. at
different branches of system is used to collect data and then can be used in
calculation for evaluating different parameters. A chiller is connected to the
system to cool down the hot fluid immediately and study the thermal
characteristics of heating as well as cooling.
7. Thermal
Energy Storage
This system
has been designed to perform TES related experiment by using PCM materials. As
there are several types of PCM, the system has been designed to perform
experiment with at least two PCM separately. Provision is also kept to examine
the combine (known as cascading) effect of two PCMs in thermal energy storage.
To visualize the phase changes in the material another set of arrangement are
there in the system.
8. Wind
Turbine Emulator
Wind turbine
emulator mimics the behaviour of wind turbine for hardware level simulations.
This system has a DC motor coupled with the Induction generator/Permanent
Magnet Synchronous Generator, speed of which is controlled as per the speed
reference calculated by solving the mathematical model of wind turbine. An
induction generator is coupled to the DC motor and bidirectional inverter is
connected to the terminals of the generator. Researcher can execute the
mathematical models of their newly developed or modified wind turbine and can
simulate the speed/power of profile of turbine on hardware environment directly
for different wind speeds & pitch angle.
9. Fuel Cell
Training System
Fuel
Cell unit receives dry hydrogen from the Hydrogen gas cylinder at preset LPM.
The generated power can be used directly by a DC load but as per the V-I curve
of Fuel cell system, the voltage reduces as we increase the load, therefore,
the power generated by fuel cell system cannot be used directly hence the
output is connected to a charge controller which charges the battery and
maintain output as per the battery voltage. The battery bank is further
connected to a home inverter so that home utilities can be used as a load for
the fuel cell system.
By
using the Fuel Cell training system, a user will be able to understand
characteristics of fuel cell with the help of resistive load or DC-DC
converter, output power variation of fuel cell with change in hydrogen supply,
fuel cell performance with DC/AC load and output variation of fuel cell with a
change in temperature.
After Installation a masters training and demonstration session was
conducted by Ecosense’s Engineers. During this session, the complete scope,
working and research possibilities of the system was discussed. The faculty
members enjoyed the demo and training session. They along with students work on
the equipment to conduct their research.