INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF RESEARCH IN TECHNOLOGY (IJRT) ISSN No.

2394-9007
Vol. V, No. I, February 2018 www.ijrtonline.org

A Review of Variable Speed Wind Turbine System

Employing DFIG
Juned Uddin Syed, Manish Prajapati

Abstract— The first and foremost wind energy conversion The results of deep penetration of wind energy into the existing
system was a constant speed drive whose efficiency was very low. utility system are the stringent grid code. The demand of the
The variable speed wind turbine was developed with the help of time is to retain the connectivity of Wind energy conversion
Doubly Fed Induction Generator. The amplitude and frequency system (WECS) at all conditions even during and after grid
of the output voltage can be maintained constant by employing
fault. The reliability of the system can be increased further if
DFIG machine, irrespective of the speed blowing on the rotor of
the wind turbine. This paper presents a condensed review on WECS is capable of providing reactive demand of the system.
application of DFIG on variable speed wind generated electric The DFIG based WECS is capable in meeting the above
power. mentioned necessities. It is the most widely used wind system
Keywords: Wind energy conversion system (WECS), Doubly-Fed
having a large world share now a days due to the several merits
Induction Generators (DFIGs, fixed speed generators (FSG), it possess in comparison to other WECS. This paper presents a
adjustable speed generators (ASG). brief review on DFIG based WECS, discussing about its
merits, demerits, and construction and control strategies.
I. INTRODUCTION
Doubly-Fed electric machines are fundamentally electric II. CLASSIFICATION OF WECS
machines that are sustained with alternating current streams The wind turbines are broadly classified as fixed speed
into both their stator and rotor windings. Most doubly- generators (FSG) type and adjustable speed generators (ASG).
encouraged electric machines in industry today are three-stage The FSG are constructed based on “Danish concept” as shown
wound-rotor acceptance machines. In spite of the fact that in Fig-1. Generally FSG are low power rating WECS
their standards of task have been known for quite a long time, constructed with squirrel cage induction generators directly
doubly-Fed electric machines have just as of late gone into connected to the three phase utility grid. A fixed ratio gear box
basic utilize. This is expected exclusively to the appearance of couples the rotor of turbine to the generator shaft. The design
wind control advances for power age. and operation of FSG generally depends on turbine
Doubly-Fed Induction Generators (DFIGs) are by a wide
mechanical system like; breaker switching rate, time constant
margin the most broadly utilized kind of doubly-bolstered
of pitch control etc. the mechanical circuit requires sturdy
electric machine, and are a standout amongst the most widely
control to absorb the high mechanical stress during sudden
recognized kinds of generator used to create power in wind
turbines. DFIG generators have various preferences over change in grid condition hence an expensive mechanical
different sorts of generators when utilized as a part of wind construction is required for stable operation at high power
turbines. rating.
The essential favorable position of DFIG when utilized as
a part of wind turbines is that they permit the sufficiency and
recurrence of their yield voltages to be kept up at a consistent
esteem, regardless of the speed of the wind blowing on the
wind turbine rotor. Along these lines, DFIG can be
specifically direct association with the AC power system and
stay synchronized consistently with the AC power system
Other advantages include the ability to control the power
FSG
factor (e.g., to maintain the power factor at unity), while
keeping the power electronics devices in the wind turbine at a
moderate size.
Manuscript received on February, 2018.
Juned Uddin Syed, M.Tech Scholar, Department of Electrical Engineering,
Fig. 1: Fixed speed generator type wind turbine
Scope College of Engineering, Bhopal, M.P., India.
Prof. Manish Prajapati, Asst. Professor, Department of Electrical The ASG are available in two designs one is direct-in-line
Engineering, Scope College of Engineering, Bhopal, M.P., India. (fig. 2) and other is DFIG (fig. 3) based variable speed drives.

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Vol. V, No. I, February 2018
In direct-in-line structure the variable frequency ac power is
generated using synchronous generator. A power converter
connected in series with the ASG transforms this variable-
frequency ac power into fixed-frequency ac power. These
direct- in-line systems have been built up to 1.5 MW.
ISSN No. 2394-9007
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III. PRINCIPLE OF OPERATION OF DFIG
Despite of the variation of wind speed, it is possible to obtain
constant output voltage and frequency of the generator by
adjusting the ac current fed into the rotor winding. This can be
achieved by employing quasi control mechanism.

Fig. 2: Direct-in-line based wind turbine system Fig. 3: Doubly fed induction generator based wind turbine system.
DFIG is designed with three phase wound rotor induction By employing DFIG in ASG it could be possible to generate
machine operating as a synchronous machine. The speed of electrical power at lower wind speeds than with fixed-speed
the rotor is varied by varying the frequency of the rotor wind turbines using an asynchronous generator. The power
current. Mechanical power at the machine shaft is converted electronics devices used in doubly-fed induction generators
into electrical power supplied to the ac power network via require only processing a small ratio of the generator output
both the stator and rotor windings. The relationship between power, i.e., the power that is supplied to or from the generator
the stator frequency and the rotor speed can be expressed as; rotor windings, which is typically about 30% of the generator
nrotor Npoles
rated power. Consequently, the power electronics devices in
fstator  variable-speed wind turbines using doubly-fed induction
generators typically need only to be about 30% of the size of
120
the power electronics devices used for comparatively sized
Where; fstator is the frequency of the induced ac voltage of three-phase synchronous generators, as shown in Fig-4. This
the stator in hertz, reduces the cost of the power electronics devices, as well as
nrotor is speed of rotor in rpm, the power losses in these devices. DFIG is constructed using
two DC/AC converters and one three phase PWM inverter
Npoles no. of poles. designed with IGBT. The DC/AC converters allow power to
As compare to Direct-in-line type ASG, DFIG has various flow from the ac power source to the generator rotor windings
advantages like reduced inverter cost since only 30% of the only. This makes sure that the switch on the IGBT Inverter is
rated power is required to design the inverter of the equivalent set to the on position. This allows power that comes from the
capacity. Reduced cost of filter since inverter size is reduced; generator rotor windings under certain operating conditions to
only small fraction of harmonics is present. Improved be dissipated into a dump resistor integrated into the three-
efficiency and self-power factor control are also the phase PWM inverter, as is done in many actual doubly-fed
advantages of DFIG. induction generators. In certain some DFIG based WECS two
TABLE I: THE COMPARISON BETWEEN FSG AND ASG bidirectional AC/DC converters (three-phase PWM
Fixed Speed Generator Adjustable Speed Generator rectifier/inverter) are used to allow power flow in both
Available in low power ratings Available in high power ratings directions. This allows power coming from the generator rotor
At high power they have They have simple pitch control winding to be returned to the ac power source, thereby
complex pitch control and are and are efficient for high power increasing the total power supplied to the source. This
expensive ratings operation also helps in compensating reactive power of the
They undergo high stress at They have reduced mechanical system. In literature many papers has been sited were DFIG is
high ratings stress also performing the function of static reactive power
Poor power quality High power quality compensator or employed with universal filtering capability to
Since speed is fixed hence Improves system efficiency in mitigate load current harmonics or to reduce the Total
efficiency degrades variable wind speed by adjusting Harmonic Distortion of output voltages. Hence DFIG can
the rotor speed perform many functions and can fulfill the need of present day
High acoustic noise Low acoustic noise power scenario where all the utility systems are operating near
stability limit and any thrust may lead to system failure.

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INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF RESEARCH IN TECHNOLOGY (IJRT)
Vol. V, No. I, February 2018
Fig. 4: Circuit topology of DFIG based WECS.
IV. CONCLUSION
In literature two types of variable speed wind turbine system
are mentioned, this paper presents a general overview of
Direct-in-line and DFIG based WECS. There comparative
analysis and advantages and disadvantages are also been
discussed here. Circuit topology of DFIG based WECS has
been shown with control architecture. In general fixed speed
wind turbine is used for lower power rating of about few
hundreds of kilowatts and for rating above it variable speed
type wind turbines are installed. The DFIF based WECS are
used for power rating upto1.5 MW, since it is more
economical and efficient.
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