Current self-control applied to sensorless permanent magnet synchronous generators

This work presents a novel current control concept to be applied to three-phase variable speed electrical generators. The control strategy is based on current self-control strategies that are employed in power factor corrected rectifiers. However, the modifications proposed here provide reactive power compensation, so that the proposed control strategy becomes equivalent to field-oriented control strategies. Furthermore, the proposed control concept does not make use of mechanical sensors, i.e., speed nor position axis sensors and is, thus, a sensorless strategy. The main feature of this sensorless strategy in contrast to typical field-oriented control ones is that the control performance does not require any knowledge of the winding resistances, which presents strong variations with temperature and influences the typical sensorless field-oriented control strategies.