Differential flatness based-control of wind generator/supercapacitor power plant

This paper presents a system using a supercapacitor storage device to smoothen the output power fluctuation of a variable-speed wind generator. This kind of system is a multiconverter structure and exhibits nonlinear behavior. In this paper, a nonlinear control algorithm based on the flatness properties of the system is proposed. Utilizing the flatness principle, we propose simple solutions to the energy-management and stabilization problems. To authenticate the proposed control laws, a test bench is realized in the laboratory. The control algorithm is digitally implemented by dSPACE controller DS1104. Experimental results with small-scale devices (a wind generator of 500 W and a supercapacitor bank of 100 F, 32 V, and 500 A) corroborate the superb performance during load cycles.