Improved Hydroturbine Control and Future Prospects of Variable Speed Hydropower Plant

Hydroturbine control system (HTCS) is a nonlinear, nonminimum phase system comprising of speed/frequency sensors, hydraulic servo motors, wicket gates, gate position feedback mechanism, and proportional integral derivative (PID) controller (governor). Governor controls the guide vane opening (GVO) corresponding to the input (speed/frequency). Nowadays, HTCS becomes more intricate insight of variable speed doubly-fed induction generator for compensating wide variation in water head. Hence, robust control techniques are necessary for the optimal utilization of hydropower potential. In this article, a brief review of HTCS is given and a complimentary sliding-mode controller (CSMC) is designed for GVO serving a 250 MW hydrogenerating unit. The CSMC control law is derived and the stability is verified through the Lyapunov function. Simulation is carried out through the MatLab Simulink environment for a 250 MW HTCS. Then, the performance of CSMC for GVO and its influence on the generator characteristics are analyzed and compared with the traditional PID controller. The simulation results demonstrate the efficacy of the controller during the startup process, subsynchronous, and super synchronous mode of operations. It is inferred that the proposed CSMC has three times faster settling time than that of the traditional PID controller. Experimental validation is carried out with a scaled-down laboratory prototype. Furthermore, future scope and design challenges associated with the hydropower control system are illustrated.