Improving the efficiency of a wind turbine using Thyristor Switched Series Capacitors - A simulation study

摘要

The paper describes the operation of a Thyristor Switched Series Capacitors (TSSC) circuit for wind turbines. The TSSC circuit belongs to the Controlled Series Capacitor (CSC) circuits that have been used in power transmission lines to improve the power factor. But to improve the efficiency of a wind turbine and make it more fault-tolerant is to avoid gearboxes and use direct-drive systems that employ variable speed electric generators and solid-state electronic converters. The downside is that systems like the above suffer from high inductive reactance, therefore, there is the need to counteract for any reactive losses, to improve the power factor as well as the efficiency [1]. This paper describes the benefits and drawbacks of applying the TSSC to a typical wind turbine by PSPICE simulation and suggests a new topology called Thyristor Switched Parallel Capacitors (TSPC). The near future implementation will be hosted in an FPGA.