Comparative Analysis of Fault Current Limiters With and Without Shunt Path for LVRT Improvement of Grid Connected Wind Turbine Generator

Electrical power generation through renewable energy sources has increased exponentially worldwide in the last decade due to its ability to address a variety of issues such as environmental and economic. As the penetration of renewable sources like wind energy and solar energy has increased, the power system operators have made revisions to the existing grid codes. The grid codes have been made more stringent, and they must be met by all the generators connected to the grid. Low voltage ride through(LVRT) is one among the essential grid codes requirement for wind turbine generators (WTGs) connected to the grid. LVRT is the ability of WTGs to remain in synchronism with the grid under system disturbances for a specific time as prescribed by grid codes. Researchers have proposed a variety of solutions for LVRT improvement i.e. use of crowbar, DC Chopper, FACTs devices, and fault current limiters (FCLs), etc. The FCLs not only enhances LVRT performance of wind farms but also protect the converters and DC link of doubly fed induction generators (DFIG). This paper compares and analyzes the operation of various types of FCLs, mainly with shunt path and without shunt paths, for symmetrical fault at the terminal of a DFIG-based wind farm (WF) connected as a single machine infinite bus (SMIB).