A utility interactive wind energy conversion scheme with an asynchronous DC link using a supplementary control loop

The paper presents modelling, simulation and experimental verification of a utility interactive wind energy conversion scheme with an asynchronous link comprised of a diode bridge rectifier and a line commutated inverter. The control objective is to track and extract maximum power from the wind energy system and transfer this power to the electric utility. This is achieved by controlling the firing delay angle of the inverter. Since the diode bridge rectifier has no control on the DC link voltage, a supplementary control loop is used to limit the voltage within a preset voltage threshold. The proposed scheme for regulating the flow of power through the DC link ensures reduced reactive power burden on the self-excitation capacitor banks and better utilisation of available wind energy, while limiting the DC link voltage within a preset voltage threshold. The simulated results are experimentally verified and found to give good power tracking performance.<>