Professional Documents
Culture Documents
Philippe Maibach, Alexander Faulstich, Markus Eichler, Stephen Dewar ABB Switzerland Ltd CH-5300 Turgi, Switzerland Phone: +41 58 58 9 32 35 Fax: +41 58 58 9 26 18 E-mail: philippe.maibach@ch.abb.com alexander.faulstich@ch.abb.com markus.eichler@ch.abb.com stephen.dewar@ch.abb.com URL: www.abb.com
Abstract The ongoing increase in the share of wind power in installed generation capacity continuously increasing number of wind power plants brought into operation forces the transmission system operators (TSO) to tighten their grid connection rules in order to limit the effects on network quality. These new rules demand that wind power plants and farms support the electricity network throughout their operation. Wind turbines using full-scale converters include several advantages and are most suitable to be adapted flexibly to different grid requirements without the need for additional reactive power compensation equipment. With larger turbine unit sizes, medium-voltage converter systems are suitable for the corresponding high power. Based on platforms widely used for industrial drives applications, ABB has successfully applied reliable medium-voltage converter technology to wind power. Keywords: IGCT, Permanent magnet generator, Wind generator systems, Voltage Source Inverters, Grid code
Introduction
In the early days of the wind power industry, wind turbine manufacturers developed lower power wind turbines, which were installed as single units or in small groups at a given location. Increasingly higher power turbines are installed and grouped into large farms or wind power stations. The turbine manufacturers are faced with a number of challenges such as larger and heavier mechanical structures, more severe safety issues, environmental compatibility issues, handling high electrical power within the nacelle and tower, and last but not least the set-up of wind parks and connecting them to the distribution or transmission grid. Integration of ever larger wind farms to the utility grids is increasingly challenging because Distribution and Transmission System Operators (DSO and TSO) require a wind power station to behave similarly to a conventional power station. This is the background to the grid code modifications seen during the last few years. This paper proposes full-scale medium-voltage converters for high-power wind turbines as a contribution to facilitate the integration of large wind turbines into an existing grid.
Field of application
Growing wind turbine power ratings come along with larger gearboxes, generators, transformers and power electronics. The doubly-fed induction generator is one preferred solution with the advantage of little required power electronics. However, fault ride-through requirements can increase the power electronic effort needed. Another widely used solution is a synchronous generator combined with a full-scale converter, i.e. the generator is connected to the grid via a power electronic converter rated for the full generator power. Both solutions are currently realized at low-voltage level (below 1000 Vrms) for low power up to even the highest power ratings, i.e. < 1 MW up to some of the existing 5 MW pilot installations. As wind turbine powers increase the corresponding increase in current to be handled requires the connections become bulkier. Especially at low-voltage level this is a disadvantage, but it can be overcome if the transformer is placed inside the nacelle. However, this has the disadvantage of a considerable increase in the nacelle weight, with implications on logistics and mechanics. An interesting compromise which allows a lower nacelle weight and reduced interconnection effort is to apply a full-scale medium-voltage converter in conjunction with a medium-voltage permanent magnet synchronous generator. For the avoidance of doubt, in this paper the term medium-voltage describes electric equipment with a voltage rating of more than 1 kV but less than 5 kV. The transformer does not need to be placed inside the nacelle; and the cabling effort is comparable to a medium power low-voltage wind turbine installation. As a major additional advantage, the system can make use of the well-defined fault-ride-through behavior of the converter.
3.1
Figure 1: VDN power factor specification Figure 2 shows an example valid for the British grid. The black lines apply for transmission system, the red lines for the distribution system.
Figure 2: British Grid Code reactive power requirements Some grid codes require the implementation of a voltage control functionality as it is well known for other generators: Reactive power has to be provided depending on the system voltage following a droop characteristic. Thereby, the provided reactive power is a linear function of the system voltage. Parameters such as target voltage and droop slope have to be altered remotely by the overriding controller.
3.2
3.3
Full-Scale Converter
Figure 5 shows the basic diagram of a full-scale four-quadrant wind power converter. The main building blocks of the converter are the two inverter modules connected by the dc link and the grid filter module. IGCTs (Integrated Gate Commutated Thyristors) are used as semiconductor switches. These elements are a further development of the Gate Turn-Off Thyristor (GTO). IGCTs are inherently robust semiconductor elements like thyristors. They have considerably better switching behavior than GTOs and have been proven to be an excellent semiconductor switch for a number of different applications as e.g. industrial medium-voltage drives or frequency converters for railway grids. In all these applications, excellent field experience can be reported. A three-level topology is used for this power range and kind of application. Three-level inverters are commonly used in medium-voltage industrial converters. In [1] a more detailed description of the three-level topology is given. The main advantages of this topology are lower output current ripple and better harmonic performance compared to a two-level topology operated at the same semiconductor switching frequency. The basic circuit diagram also shows auxiliary circuits like the clamping circuits and the slope filter on the generator side. This filter is used to slow down the voltage slopes on the generator side and thus to avoid excessive over-voltage in the generator caused by reflection on the interconnection of converter to generator. The grid filter is a LC filter in combination with a damping circuit for the lowest order harmonic. This filter is designed to meet the stringent VDEW requirements [4]. It also meets IEC 61000-2-12 [3] and IEEE 519-1992 [2] requirements.
Figure 5: Basic circuit diagram of the 4-quadrant wind power converter In [1] a benchmark with alternative converter solutions is presented. A four-quadrant converter would allow for a bi-directional power flow which is not necessarily required for this application. However, the comparison shows that a converter topology as proposed is the optimum for the whole system because of the following reasons: The elevated semiconductor switching frequency allows a very low current ripple on the generator side to be achieved, resulting in very low torque ripple stress in the shaft and/or gear box. A four-quadrant converter is able to draw reactive power from the generator. Doing so, it is possible to keep the converter terminal voltage and the DC link voltage constant over the whole speed range.
Constant DC link voltage is important to best utilize the converter and be able to deliver full rated power at reduced speed. All these properties could not be realized with a simple diode rectifier on the generator side. Although most of todays turbines built for full-scale power conversion are equipped with synchronous generators, there are also opportunities to use the robust and cheap induction generator. Induction generators require the converter to be able to deliver the magnetization current, i.e. a 4Q converter is required to run an induction generator with a full-scale power conversion.
Power Rating
The power rating of wind turbines of interest for the use with full-scale medium-voltage converters starts in the 3-4 MW range and currently ends at 5 MW. Larger wind turbines are in discussion for the future. ABB have developed and successfully commissioned full-scale medium-voltage converters for a 2 MW wind turbine manufacturer [1]. At the time of writing this paper a prototype converter for the Multibrid M5000 5 MW wind turbine is being commissioned [6]. Both designs are based on IGCT converters for industrial medium-voltage applications. In order to meet the requirements of grid codes as discussed above, the converter rating needs to be considerably higher than the nominal wind turbine power rating. The converter rating should also be adapted to the wind turbine overload capability. This leads to a continuous converter power rating well in excess of 120% of the turbine nominal rating. Compared to other semiconductor switches applied to the same power range, IGCTs produce lower losses. This allows the converters to be operated at an elevated switching frequency, and therefore the use of a reduced grid filter size. Furthermore the low losses result in a high conversion efficiency: the losses of the 5 MW wind turbine converter are in the order of 2% to 2.5%.
Converter Behavior
Following, simulation results are presented, valid for the converter for a 5 MW wind turbine. Positive reactive power corresponds to over-excited operation.
Reactive power/current capability at different balanced faults. The grid voltage is measured at the connection point of the wind turbine to the distribution system.
Figure 10: Grid voltage, current, active and reactive power during a single phase voltage dip to 70%
Figure 11: Grid voltage, current, active and reactive power during a single phase voltage dip to 18%
Figure 12: Grid voltage, current, active and reactive power during a two phase voltage dip to 50%
Figure 13: Grid voltage, current, active and reactive power during a two phase voltage dip to 25%
Conclusion
ABB has successfully applied reliable and efficient medium-voltage converter technology to wind power applications. The combination of powerful hardware and flexible control topology, supported by enhanced simulation facilities, is best suited to serve the wind power industry and to integrate even the largest wind turbines into grids with demanding connection requirements.
10 References
[1] A. Faulstich, J. K. Steinke, F. Wittwer, Medium Voltage Converter for Permanent Magnet Wind Power Generators up to 5 MW, EPE 2005 Dresden [2] IEEE Recommended Practices and Requirements for Harmonic Control in Electrical Power Systems, IEEE 519-1992 [3] Electromagnetic compatibility (EMC) Part 2-12: Environment Compatibility levels for lowfrequency conducted disturbances and signalling in public medium-voltage power supply systems, IEC 61000-2-12 [4] Verband der Netzbetreiber VDN e.V. beim VDEW (German Electricity Association), REA generating plants connected to the HV and EHV networks, Berlin, Germany, August 2004. http://www.vdn-berlin.de/global/downloads/englisch/service/RL_EEG_HH_EN_2004-08.pdf [5] British Grid Code, Issue 3, Revision 16, 30th May 2006 [6] Multibrid Entwicklungsgesellschaft mbH, www.multibrid.com
ZAB3BHS253163E01