Application of Individual Pitch Controller for Flicker Reduction on Variable Speed Wind Turbines

This article reviews the design of algorithms for individual pitch control in the case of variable speed turbines. The aim of the designed control algorithm is to improve the power quality and to reduce voltage flicker. A simulation model of variable speed wind turbine was developed with the simulation tool of PSCAD/EMTDC. This article compared the individual pitch action and the collective pitch action, which is the same for all three blades, is calculated by means of a standard classical PI-based controller. The simulation result indicates that compared with the flicker coefficient of PI controlled wind turbine, the variable-speed wind turbines equipped with individual pitch controller, exhibit good behavior with respect to output power and voltage flicker, especially for 3P frequency reduction. Thereby, the variable-speed wind turbine with individual pitch controller will produce lower voltage flicker.