Small signal stability analysis and optimal control of a

wind turbine with doubly fed induction generator

F. Wu, X.-P. Zhang, K. Godfrey and P. Ju
Abstract: A novel method using particle swarm optimisation (PSO) is proposed for optimising parameters of controllers of a wind turbine (WT) with doubly fed induction generator (DFIG). The
PSO algorithm is employed in the proposed parameter tuning method to search for the optimal parameters of controllers and achieve the optimal coordinated control of multiple controllers of WT
system. The implementation of the algorithm for optimising the controllers parameters is
described in detail. In the analysis, the generic dynamic model of WT with DFIG and its associated
controllers is presented, and the small signal stability model is derived; based on this, an
eigenvalue-based objective function is utilised in the PSO-based optimisation algorithm to optimise
the controllers parameters. With the optimised controller parameters, the system stability is
improved under both small and large disturbances. Furthermore, the fault ride-through capability
of the WT with DFIG can be improved using the optimised controller. Simulations are performed
to illustrate the control performance.

Introduction

Wind power generation has been developed very quickly

during the past few years. At present, the capacity of the
installed wind power in the world is more than 40 GW.
With the growing penetration of wind energy into power
grids, the impact of WT on power system stability is of
increasing concern. In development of the wind turbine
(WT) techniques, several types of WT have been used.
Recently, the WT with doubly fed induction generator
(DFIG) is becoming popular [1]; this has the characteristics
of high transfer efficiency of energy, low investment and
flexible control. The stator of the DFIG is normally connected to a power grid directly, and its rotor winding is
fed back from the terminal of the stator by controlled
voltage source converters. The converters only supply the
exciting current of the DFIG; hence the capacity is fairly
low, approximately 20 25% of the DFIG rated capacity.
The fed back converters are based on insulated gate
bipolar transistors, such that the control of the DFIG is flexible, and the controllers have significant effect on the stability of the WT with DFIG.
Many models of WT with DFIG have been proposed in
recent years. A third-order model suitable for transient
stability analysis was presented in [2], it was implemented
in power system simulator for engineering (PSS/E), and
simulations of the dynamics of the WT with DFIG were
also given. In [3], a detailed dynamic model of DFIG
was proposed, and the small signal stability was analysed.
# The Institution of Engineering and Technology 2007
doi:10.1049/iet-gtd:20060395
Paper first received 2nd October 2006 and in revised form 18th January 2007
F. Wu and X.-P. Zhang are with the Institute for Energy Research and Policy,
University of Birmingham, Birmingham B15 2TT, UK
K. Godfrey is with the School of Engineering, University of Warwick, Coventry
CV4 7AL, UK
P. Ju is with the College of Electrical Engineering, HoHai University, Nanjing
210098, China
E-mail: X.P.Zhang@bham.ac.uk
IET Gener. Transm. Distrib., 2007, 1, (5), pp. 751 760

However in these papers, the detailed model of converters

and WT controllers are either not included, or are simplified. It has been recognised that the DFIG controllers have
significant effects on the WT system stability, such that
the dynamic model of converters and controllers should
be derived and included in the model of WT with DFIG
system for the dynamic analysis.
A decoupling control strategy for the active power and
reactive power of DFIG was proposed in [4], and it has
been widely used in previous research work [58].
The control strategy is based on proportional-integral (PI)
controllers; these are well accepted and used in the engineering field for their reliability and robust control performance.
It is well recognised that suitable parameters are needed for
controllers in order to achieve better control performance
for system stability. The decoupling control algorithm of a
WT with DFIG consists of five different PI controllers. It
has been found that the coordination among these
controllers using the traditional trial and error parameter
tuning method is a very difficult and challenging task.
Recently genetic algorithm (GA)-based optimisation
methods have been utilised in controller parameter
tuning. In principle, the problem of parameter tuning is
to search a set of optimal parameters in the problem
space to achieve the best control performance of
systems. GA has been used in static VAr compensator
controller parameter design in [9], and hydro-generator
governor parameter tuning in [10]. However, some
deficiencies of GA have been identified in recent research
work [11]. The degradation in efficiency is apparent
when the parameters being optimised are highly correlated, and the premature convergence of the GA degrades
its performance in terms of reducing the search capability
of GA.
Particle swarm optimisation (PSO) is a new optimisation
method, which is an evolutionary computation technique in
nature motivated by the simulation of social behaviour. In
searching the optimal solution of a problem, information
of the best position of each individual particle and the
best position among the whole swarm are used to direct
751

the searching. Hence, in comparison with GA, PSO is quite

immune to local optima and is reasonably efficient in
solving problems with complex hyperspace. In [12], PSO
has been applied in power system reactive power and
voltage control, and a multi-agent-based PSO has been utilised in optimal reactive power dispatch [13]. In the field of
controller design, PSO has been introduced successfully in
optimal design of automatic voltage controller [14] and parameter tuning of PSS [15]. However, in [14, 15], only one
proportional-integral-derivative (PID) controller with three
parameters was optimised; hence the coordination
between different PID controllers was not addressed.
PSO has also been employed to design the optimal
control for the WT with DFIG in [16]. In this design,
the controller of the rotor-side converter was optimised,
and a time-domain fitness function, which aims to
reduce the over-current in the rotor circuit and the
steady state error, was used in the optimisation. Using
the optimised controller, the current in the rotor circuit
under the system disturbance was reduced effectively.
However, as pointed out, since the settling time was not
considered in the design objective, and the controller of
the grid-side converter was not optimised, the cost of
reducing the over-current in the rotor circuit was an
increase of settling time of the rotor current and the
larger oscillations of the DC-link voltage.
The generic model of WT with DFIG including its converters and controllers is presented, based on which the
small signal stability model is derived. With the objective
function of optimised dynamic damping performance, a
new optimal tuning method for the controllers parameters
of WT with DFIG using PSO is described. In the optimisation, the rotor-side converter controller and the grid-side
converter controller are coordinated, and ten parameters
are optimised simultaneously. Simulations are performed
on a single machine infinite bus (SMIB) system and a fourmachine system to simulate the dynamics of the WT system
under small and large disturbances to demonstrate the
control performance of the systems with the optimised controller parameters.

2
2.1

Fig. 1 Equivalent circuit of DFIG system

a Equivalent circuit of DFIG
b Equivalent circuit of fed back converter

dEd0
L
1
sr vs Eq0
vs m vqr
0
dt
Lrr
T0
h
i
 Ed0 (Xs
Xs0 )iqs

(3)

dEq0
L
1

sr vs Ed0 vs m vdr
0
dt
Lrr
T0
h
i
 Eq0
(Xs
Xs0 )ids

(4)

Model of WT with DFIG

Model of DFIG system

Basically, DFIG is an induction-type generator. The equivalent circuit of DFIG as shown in Fig. 1a is similar to that of
an induction machine [17].
Defining E d0 2(vsLm/Lrr)cqr , E q0 2(vsLm/Lrr)cdr ,
Xs vsLss , X s0 vs[Lss 2 (L2m/Lrr)], T00 Lrr/Rr , the
model of DFIG can be given as follows



Xs0 dids
1
0
vds
Rs
(X
Xs )
vs dt
vs T00 s

where cdr and cqr are the direct (d ) and quadrature (q)
axis rotor flux linkages, respectively; Lss is the stator
self-inductance; Lrr is the rotor self-inductance; Lm is
the mutual inductance; Rr is the rotor resistance; vs is
the synchronous angle speed; sr is the rotor slip; Xs
is the stator reactance; X s0 is the stator transient reactance;
E d0 and E q0 are the d and q axis voltages behind the transient reactance, respectively; T 00 is the rotor circuit time
constant; ids and iqs are the d and q axis stator currents,
respectively; vds and vqs are the d and q axis stator terminal voltages, respectively; vdr and vqr are the d and q axis
rotor voltages, respectively.

 ids
(1
sr )Ed0
Lm
1
v
E0 Xs0 iqs
Lrr dr vs T00 q



Xs0 diqs
1
0
vqs
Rs
(X


X
)
s
vs dt
vs T00 s

2.2
(1)

 iqs
(1
sr )Eq0


752

Lm
1
v

E0
Xs0 ids
Lrr qr vs T00 d

(2)

Model of drive train

The drive train comprises turbine, gearbox, shafts and

other mechanical components of WT, which is usually
represented by a two-mass model [3]. The generator
rotor shaft is connected to the turbine shaft flexibly via
gearbox and coupling, the two-mass model is given by
2Ht

dvt
Tm
Tsh
dt

(5)

IET Gener. Transm. Distrib., Vol. 1, No. 5, September 2007

dutw
vt
vr vt
(1
sr )vs
dt
ds
2Hg r
Tem
Tsh
dt
du
Tsh Ksh utw Dsh tw
dt

(6)
(7)
(8)

where Ht and Hg are the inertia constants of the turbine

and the generator, respectively; vt is the WT angle
speed; vr is the generator rotor angle speed; utw is the
shaft twist angle; Ksh is the shaft stiffness coefficient;
Dsh is the damping coefficient; Tsh is the shaft torque;
Tm is the wind torque, which is the power input of the
WT; Tem is the electromagnetic torque. Tm and Tem are
given by
Tm

0:5rpR2 Cp Vw3
vt

Tem Ps =vs

(9)
(10)

where



1 RCf
Cp

0:022b
2 e
0:255RCf =l
2 l

(11)

Model of controllers

The decoupling control strategy developed in [4] is used for

the active power and reactive power of WT with DFIG
system. Aligning the direction of the d axis of the d 2 q
reference frame with the stator voltage, vqs becomes zero,
wheareas vds is equal to the magnitude of the terminal
voltage, and then the grid-side active power and reactive
power can be controlled independently by idg and iqg ,
respectively. The stator active power and voltage can also
be controlled independently using a decoupling control
technique.
3.1

Rotor-side converter controller model

The rotor-side converter controller aims to control the DFIG

output active power for tracking the input of the WT torque,
and to maintain the terminal voltage to control setting. The
active power and voltage are controlled independently via
vqr and vdr , respectively. The control block diagrams are
shown in Fig. 2a, while control equations are given by
dx1
Pref Ps
dt
iqr

ref

Kp1 (Pref Ps ) Ki1 x1

(17)
(18)

where r is the air density; R is the WT blade radius; Vw is

the wind speed; Cf is the blade design constant coefficient;
b is the blade pitch angle; l is the blade tip speed ratio,
l vtR/Vw; Cp is the power coefficient, the maximum Cp
may be achieved by controlling the WT speed in order to
track the maximum power from wind; Ps is the stator
active power.
2.3

Model of converter

The configuration of the fed back converters is shown in

Fig. 1b, the active power flow through the converters is
balanced. With the directions of the currents as shown in
Fig. 1b, the power balance equation can be obtained
Pr Pg PDC

(12)

where Pr is the active power at the AC terminal of the rotorside converter; Pg is the active power at the AC terminal of
the grid-side converter; PDC is the active power of the DC
link. These are given by
Pr vdr idr vqr iqr

(13)

Pg vdg idg vqg iqg

(14)

PDC vDC iDC
CvDC

dvDC
dt

(15)

where idr and iqr are the d and q axis rotor currents, respectively; idg and iqg are the d and q axis currents of the grid-side
converter, respectively; vdg and vqg are the d and q axis voltages of the grid-side converter, respectively; vDC is the
capacitor DC voltage; iDC is the current of the capacitor;
C is the capacitance of the capacitor.
Substituting (13 15) into (12), the model of the converters and DC link can be derived as follows
Fig. 2 Control block of the WT system

dv
CvDC DC vdg idg vqg iqg
(vdr idr vqr iqr )
dt
IET Gener. Transm. Distrib., Vol. 1, No. 5, September 2007

(16)

a Rotor-side converter control block diagram

b Grid-side converter control block diagram
c Pitch control block diagram
753

dx2
iqr
dt

ref

iqr

Kp1 (Pref Ps ) Ki1 x1
iqr

dx3
vs
dt
idr

ref

vs

ref

Kp3 (vs

dx4
idr
dt

ref

(20)

vs ) Ki3 x3

ref

(19)

(21)
3.3

idr

Kp3 (vs

vs ) Ki3 x3
idr

ref

where Kpdg and Kidg are the proportional and integrating

gains of the DC bus voltage regulator, respectively; Kpg
and Kig are the proportional and integrating gains of the
grid-side converter current regulator, respectively; vDC_ref
is the voltage control reference of the DC link; iqg_ref is
the control reference for the q axis component of the gridside converter current.

(22)

vqr Kp2 (Kp1 DP Ki1 x1
iqr )

Ki2 x2 sr vs Lm ids sr vs Lrr iqr

The pitch of the blade is controlled to maintain the rotating

speed of the WT to the optimal speed. The control block
diagram is illustrated in Fig. 2c, while the control equation
is given by

(23)

db
T
Tsh
Kp4 m
Ki4 Dvt
dt
2Ht

vdr Kp2 (Kp3 Dv Ki3 x3
idr )

Ki2 x4
sr vs Lm iqs
sr vs Lrr idr

(24)

where Kp1 and Ki1 are the proportional and integrating gains
of the power regulator, respectively; Kp2 and Ki2 are the proportional and integrating gains of the rotor-side converter
current regulator, respectively; Kp3 and Ki3 are the proportional and integrating gains of the grid voltage regulator,
respectively; idr_ref and iqr_ref are the current control references for the d and q axis components of the generator
side converter, respectively; vs_ref is the specified terminal
voltage reference; Pref is the active power control reference
and is given by
Pref PB

vt
vtB

(25)

Pitch controller

where Kp4 and Ki4 are the proportional and integrating gains
of the WT speed regulator, respectively; Dvt is the deviation of the WT rotating speed.
4

Dynamic model of WT with DFIG system

Equations (1) (7) and (16) form the model of the WT with
DFIG, among which (1) and (2) describe the dynamics of
the stator current, and may be neglected in electromechanical transient stability analysis by making the left hand side
differentials equal to zero. Equations (17), (19), (20), (22)
(24), (26), (28) (32) form the model of the controllers. The
dynamic model of the WT with DFIG may be written in the
compact form
x_ f (x, z, u)
z g(x, u)

where vtB is the base of the WT rotating speed; PB is the

maximum output active power at vtB .
3.2

Grid-side converter controller

The grid-side converter controller, as shown in Fig. 2b, aims

to maintain the DC link voltage, and control the terminal
reactive power. The voltage of the DC link is controlled
by idg while the reactive power is controlled by iqg . With
introducing the intermediate variables x5 , x6 and x7 , the following equations based on Fig. 2b can be obtained
dx5
vDC
dt
idg

ref

ref

vDC

KPdg DvDC KIdg x5

dx6
idg
dt

ref

dx7
iqg
dt

ref

Dvdg Kpg

iqg

(27)

(28)
(29)

754

(30)

dx7
Kig x7
dt

KPg (iqg

ref

iqg ) KIg x7

x [vt , b, utw , sr , ids , iqs , Ed0 , Eq0 , x1 , x2 , x3 , x4 , vDC , x5 , x6 , x7 ]T ,

z [vdr , vqr , vdg , vqg ]T ,
u [vds , vqs , idg , iqg ]T

5
Small signal stability analysis model of WT
with DFIG
Interfacing with power grid

Taking the single machine and infinite bus (SMIB) system

shown in Fig. 3a as an example, the voltage equation can
be obtained
Vs /w
V /0 jXTL (
Is
Ig )

KPg (
Kpdg DvDC

Dvqg Kpg

where x, z, u are the vectors of the DFIG state variables,

control output variables and input variables, respectively,
and they are given by

5.1

dx6
Kig x6
dt

KIdg x5
idg ) KIg x6

(33)
(34)

(26)

idg

KPdg DvDC KIdg x5
idg

(32)

(31)

(35)

where V is the voltage of the infinite bus; Vs/w is the terminal voltage of the DFIG generator stator winding; XTL is the
combined reactance of the transformer and transmission
line, and given by XTL XT XL .
The network voltage equation (35) and the WT model are
presented in x y and d q references of frame, respectively.
The relationship between these two references of frame is
illustrated in Fig. 3b, while the corresponding transfer
IET Gener. Transm. Distrib., Vol. 1, No. 5, September 2007

where B is the reduced system state matrix, whose dimension is 14  14. x0 is the reduced state vector, given by
x0 [vt , b, utw , sr , Ed0 , Eq0 , x1 , x2 , x3 ,
x4 , vDC , x5 , x6 , x7 ]T
6
6.1
Fig. 3 Interface with power grid
a SMIB system
b d2q frame respect to x2y frame

function is given by



fd
cos w

fq

sin w

sin w
cos w



fx
fy

(36)

where fd and fq are the d and q axis components, respectively; fx and fy are the x and y axis components, respectively.
Substituting (36) into (35), we have
" #





vds
0

XTL
cos w
V

vqs

sin w
XTL
0
" # " #!
ids
idg


(37)
iqs
iqg
The voltage equation of the grid-side converter is







vdg
0
XTg idg
vds

vqs
vqg
XTg
0
iqg

(38)

where XTg is the reactance of the grid-side transformer.

Linearising (37) and (38), we have
"
#


Dvds
0
XTL

Dvqs

XTL
0
"
# "
#!
Didg
Dids

(39)

Diqs
Diqg
#"
"
# "
# "
#
Didg
Dvds
Dvdg
0
XTg

(40)
Dvqs
Dvqg
XTg
0
Diqg

PSO-based optimal control of WT system

Overview of PSO algorithm [18 20]

PSO, introduced by Kennedy and Eberhart in 1995, is an

evolutionary computation technique, and developed from
simulation of behaviours of bird flocking. It is a populationbased search algorithm, and the searching starts from a
group of initial positions (particles or solutions) in the
problem space in order to increase the possibility of
finding the optimal solution of the problem. The searching
strategy of PSO is similar to that of other evolutionary computation techniques, for instance GA. The searching procedure for the PSO technique is summarised as follows [18].
Step 1: Initialisation: This is to generate a group of particles
(which are named individuals in the other evolutionary
algorithms) where each particle is a candidate solution of
the problem.
Step 2: Evaluation: This is to calculate the fitness value of
each particle.
Step 3: Stopping criteria: If one of the stopping criteria is
satisfied, then stop, else go to Step 4.
Step 4: Updating velocities and positions: According to the
fitness value, different operators are used in different algorithms to update the position of the particles, so as to search
the other area in the space.
The major difference between PSO and evolutionary
algorithms is in Step 4, which is velocity and position updating. The velocity and position updating of PSO are
Table 1: Eigenvalue and participation factor analysis
of WT
l
l1,2

s
21.19

f, Hz

ASV1

66.7

10.6

ASV3

sr

utw

E d0

vDC

E q0

E d0

26.34

29.2

l5

22.0

vt

l6

272.8

vDC

l3,4

4.65

ASV2

Combining (39) and (40)

Du K1 Dx K2 Dz
5.2

(41)

Small signal stability analysis model

Linearising (33), (34), and substituting (34) and (41) into

(33), small signal stability analysis model of the WT with
DFIG can be obtained as follows
Dx ADx

(42)

Table 2: Eigenvalues and participation factor analysis

of WT with controllers
l
l1,2
l3,4
l5,6

Dx BDx

IET Gener. Transm. Distrib., Vol. 1, No. 5, September 2007

(43)

270.2
22.24
270.4

f, Hz

113.4

18

ASV1

ASV2

E q0

x3

60

9.55

Sr

utw

52.4

8.34

E d0

x1

vt

0.68

0.11

l9

217 041

vDC

l10

2173.6

x5

x6

l7,8

where A is the system state matrix, whose dimension is

16  16.
The dynamics of the stator current may be neglected in
the small signal stability analysis by setting the differentials
of the stator currents equal to zero in (42). Then the reduced
small signal stability analysis model is given by

20.32

l11

281.89

x1

x7

l12

214.5

x5

x6

l13

224.1

x2

x4

l14

224.97

x4

x2
755

Table 3:

Eigenvalues and participation factor analysis with optimised controllers parameters

l1,2

l3,4

l5,6

l7

2101

22.46

277.7

268 251

2193

59.9

67.8

63.4

l8

l9

determined by
vi, j (t 1) w(t)  vi, j (t) c1 r1 (xi, j
xi, j (t))
c1 r1 (x
j
xi, j (t))
xi, j (t 1) xi, j (t) vi, j (t 1)

(44)
(45)

where i 1, 2, . . . , n, j 1, 2, . . . , m; n is the number of

particles in each group; m is the number of the members
in a particle; vi, j(t) and vi, j(t 1) are the velocities of
member j in particle i at time t and t 1, respectively; w
is the weighting factor of velocity; c1 and c2 are the accelerating constants; r1 and r2 are random numbers between
0 and 1; xi, j(t) and xi, j(t 1) are the current positions of
member j in particle i at time t and t 1, respectively; xi, j
is the best position which particle i has achieved so far, it
is called pbest; x
j is the best position that was obtained
by any particles among the group, it is the potential solution
to the problem and is called gbest.
Equation (44) is used for the velocity updating, which
determines the direction and the velocity for changing of
position for each particle. Equation (45) is used for updating

l10

l11

l12

l13

l14

289.6

217.9

217.6

24.18

20.15

20.03

positions, which determines the new positions of particles

with respect to the previous positions of particles.
From (44) and (45), it can be seen that the best position of
the particle itself and the global best position among the
swarm are utilised to direct the position updating in PSO
algorithm, which is different from that of the other evolutionary algorithms. This feature enables PSO to have
quick convergence speed and a high possibility of finding
the global optimisation solution of the problem.
6.2

PSO-based controller parameter tuning

PSO algorithm is employed to search the optimal parameters for the controllers of WT with DFIG in order to
achieve the optimal coordinated control of multiple controllers of the WT system. The procedure of the optimal controller design is shown as follows:
Step 1: Initialisation
From Section 2, there are 12 parameters, Kp1 , Ki1 , Kp2 , Ki2 ,
Kp3 , Ki3 , Kpdg , Kidg , Kpg , Kig , Kp4 and Ki4 for the controllers
of WT system. The electrical dynamics are much faster than
mechanical dynamics, so that the control of electrical
dynamics can be decoupled from that of mechanical
dynamics. The controllers of electrical dynamics are

Fig. 4 Responses of DFIG under small disturbance

756

IET Gener. Transm. Distrib., Vol. 1, No. 5, September 2007

optimised while the parameters, Kp4 and Ki4 , are not

included in the optimisation. In this way, the number of parameters to be optimised is reduced to 10.
In the initialisation, the upper and lower bounds, Xmax
and Xmin , respectively, of the parameters should be specified at first; these define the searching space. In the searching space, n particles fXi(0), i 1, 2, . . ., ng can be
generated randomly where Xi(0) fxi,j(0), j 1, 2, . . .,
10g are the initial group of particles, and they are the start
points of the searching.
The velocity for the position updating should also be
initialised, the bound of the velocity is given by
vj, max

xj, max
xj, min

N

vj, min
vj, max ,

j 1, 2, . . . , 10

(46)

where xj,max and xj,min are the upper and lower bounds of
member j of particles, respectively; vj,max and vj,min are
the maximum and minimum velocities of member j of particles, respectively; N is the interval of the dimension, which
is normally chosen between 5 and 10. Then the initial velocities V(0) fvi,j(0), i 1, 2, . . ., n, j 1, 2, . . .,10g are
generated randomly between [vj,min , vj,max].
Step 2: Evaluation
Evaluate the fitness value of the initial group of particles
[14], which is given by
F max {Real(lg ), g 1, 2, . . . , 14}

(47)

where F is the fitness value; lg is the eigenvalue of the

system state matrix in (43); g is the number of the state

variables. The optimisation aims to minimise F in order to

shift all the eigenvalues as far to the left of the left hand
side of the complex plane as possible. It can be seen from
(43) that the intermediate variables of the controllers are
all included in the state equations. Hence, if the system is
stable, both the WT system and its controllers are stable.
Based on the fitness value, the pbest and gbest can be
obtained.
Step 3: Stopping criteria
If the stopping criteria are satisfied, then stop, else continue
to next step. Here, the stopping criteria may be the maximal
number of iterations, or the fitness value of gbest smaller
than a specified negative value.
Step 4: Updating velocities and positions
The velocity updating is given by (44) while the upper and
lower limits are considered as follows
if vi,j (t 1) . vj, max then vi,j (t 1) vj, max
if vi,j (t 1) , vj, min then vi,j (t 1) vj, min

(48)

The position updating is given by (45) while the upper

and lower limits are handled as follows
if xi,j (t 1) . xj, max then xi,j (t 1) xj, max
if xi,j (t 1) , xj, min then xi,j (t 1) xj, min

(49)

go to Step 2.

Fig. 5 Responses of DFIG under large disturbance

IET Gener. Transm. Distrib., Vol. 1, No. 5, September 2007

757

7
7.1

Small signal stability analysis of WT system

WT without controllers

The reduced small signal stability analysis model (43) is

used for the small signal stability analysis. The eigenvalues
and participation factors of the system state matrix are
calculated using the parameters presented in Appendix A.
The results are shown in Table 1, and it can be seen that
the WT system is stable since all the eigenvalues have
negative real parts. In particular, there are two modes of
oscillation with frequencies of 10.6 and 4.65 Hz, respectively. The mode with the higher oscillation frequency is
associated with the DFIG rotor speed state variables, and
the mode with the lower oscillation frequency is associated
with the DFIG stator state variables and the DC link state
variable.
7.2

WT with controllers

Small signal stability analysis for the WT with controllers

was carried out using the controller parameters listed in
Appendix B [21]. The results are shown in Table 2. It can
be found that the system is stable. In comparison with the
results in Table 1 where WT controllers are not considered,
the damping of the system increases and there are two
additional modes of oscillation: one is mainly associated
with E q0 with a frequency of 18 Hz; the other one is associated with vt of the WT with a frequency of 0.11 Hz. The
frequency of the mode associated with E d0 increases noticeably, wheareas the frequency of the mode associated with
slip Sr of the DFIG rotor decreases slightly.

7.3

Optimisation of controllers parameters

The new proposed algorithm-based PSO is used to tune the

parameters of the controllers of the WT system. The parameters of the PSO and the lower and upper bounds of controllers parameters used in optimisation are listed in Appendix C.
The proposed algorithm-based PSO was implemented in
MATLAB, and was run on a Pentium 4 2.20 GHz PC with
1 GB of RAM. It took 101 s to optimise the parameters. The
optimised parameters are presented in Appendix D.
Applying the optimised parameters of the controllers, small
signal stability analysis is carried out, and the results are
shown in Table 3. It can be seen that the number of the oscillation modes decreases from 4 to 3, while the damping
increases, and the rest of the modes are damping modes.
8

Dynamic simulations

Simulations, which were performed in MATLAB/

SIMULINK, aimed to verify the improvement in stability
by the controllers of the WT system with the optimised parameters. A SMIB system and a four-machine system were
used in the simulations.
8.1

SMIB system

The SMIB system consists of a wind farm, a motor load and

an infinite voltage source. The wind farm connects with the
infinite voltage bus through a 10 km transmission line and
the load is located at the terminal bus of the transmission
line near the infinite voltage source; the details can be
found in MATLAB v7.1 Demo [21]. The small disturbance

Fig. 6 Responses of four-machine system under small disturbance

758

IET Gener. Transm. Distrib., Vol. 1, No. 5, September 2007

Fig. 7 Responses of four-machine system under large disturbance

and large disturbance are applied to the simulated system

during simulation.
8.1.1 Small disturbance: The step changes of 20.1 and
0.1 pu are applied simultaneously to the voltage reference
and active power reference, respectively. The dynamics of
terminal voltage, output active power, output reactive
power and DC-link voltage are simulated, and the simulation results are shown in Fig. 4. It can be seen that
using the optimised controller parameters, the dynamic performance of the WT has been significantly improved where
the oscillation after the disturbance was damped out very
quickly.
8.1.2 Large disturbance: In order to investigate the
robustness of the controllers, simulations were performed
under large disturbance. A permanent three-phase ground
fault was applied on the transmission line terminal bus
near the infinite voltage source.
The responses of the WT system under this permanent
disturbance are shown in Fig. 5. It can be seen that the
responses of the WT system with the optimised controllers
are much better than those of the WT system with nonoptimised controllers. With the optimised controllers, the
terminal voltage of the WT with DFIG is restored to a
higher level than that with the non-optimised controller,
and the peak voltage of the DC-link is much lower than
that of the WT system with non-optimised controller.
Under the disturbance, the output power of the WT
system with the optimised controller can restore to the
initial level; however, the output active power of the WT
IET Gener. Transm. Distrib., Vol. 1, No. 5, September 2007

with the non-optimised controller dropped to zero because

of the limit of the stator current. It can be concluded that
applying the optimised controllers, the stator current can
be controlled within the current limit under the disturbance;
therefore the fault ride-through capability of the WT with
DFIG can be improved.
8.2

Four-machine system

The four-machine system used in the simulations was modified from the four-machine system used for small signal
stability analysis [17]. The original four-machine system
can be divided into two areas, and each of them consists
of two machines, the details of which can be found in [17,
22]. Generator 3 is replaced by a wind farm, which is the
same as that used in the above SMIB system.
8.2.1 Small disturbance: The step change of 20.1 pu
was applied to the voltage reference of the DFIG. The
dynamics of terminal voltage, DC-link voltage and output
active power are shown in Figs. 6a c, respectively. It can
be seen that using the optimised controller parameters, the
dynamic performance of the WT has been significantly
improved where the oscillation after the disturbance was
damped out very quickly. Generator 4 (G4) is near the
WT, and its dynamic responses were affected significantly.
The dynamics of the terminal voltage of G4 are illustrated in
Fig. 6d. It can be seen that applying the optimised controllers, the oscillation of the terminal voltage of G4 was
damped quickly, the damping the multi-machine system
was enhanced.
759

8.2.2 Large disturbance: The ground fault happened in

the middle of the transmission line linking the two areas.
The fault was applied at time t 0, and cleared after
0.2 s. The dynamics of the terminal voltage, DC-link
voltage and active power of the WT with DFIG are shown
in Figs. 7a c, respectively. It can be seen that in the multimachine system, the dynamics of the WT with the optimised controllers under large disturbance were improved.
The dynamics of the terminal voltage of G4 is also illustrated in Fig. 7d. It can be seen that applying the optimised
controllers, the oscillation of the terminal voltage of G4 was
damped quickly under the large disturbance.
9

Conclusion

A dynamic model of the WT with DFIG including its converters and controllers has been presented, based on which
the model for small signal stability analysis has been established. The small signal stability analysis of the WT system
with and without controllers has also been carried out. It has
been found that the WT with DFIG system without the controllers is originally stable, while using the controllers the
dynamic performance of the WT system can be improved.
A novel parameter tuning method based on PSO was proposed to optimise the parameters of the controllers. The
coordinated control of the WT system controllers has
been achieved by using an optimisation technique for
multiple controllers parameters. In the optimisation, it
has also been found that the PSO algorithm is very easy
to implement, and can find the optimised controllers
parameters very quickly. In addition, using the optimised
parameters, the dynamic performance of WT system can
be improved, and therefore the capability of the fault ridethrough can be enhanced. The numerical examples have
demonstrated the importance of the DFIG control with
properly tuned controller parameters on both the SMIB
system and the multi-machine system.
10

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11

Appendix A: parameters of WT system

Per unit system

SB 1.5 MW, VB 575 V
WT:
Ht 3 s, Hg 0.5 s, Ksh 10 pu/rad, Dsh 3.14 pu s/
rad
DFIG:
Rs 0.00706 pu, Ls 0.171 pu, Lm 2.9 pu, Rr
0.005 pu, Lr 0.156 pu, Lss Ls Lm , Lrr Lr Lm
Converter:
C 0.01F, VDC 1200 V, XTg 0.55 pu
12

Appendix B: original controller parameters

kp1 1 pu, ki1 100 s21, kp2 0.3 pu, ki2 8 s21, kp3
1.25 pu, ki3 300 s21, kp4 kp2 , ki4 ki2 , kpdg 2.4 pu,
kidg 60 s21, kp5 10 pu, ki5 100 s21, kpg 1 pu,
kig 100 s21
13 Appendix C: parameters used during
optimisation
Parameters of PSO
n 100, N 10
w 0.9, c1 2, c2 2
Lower and upper bounds for controller parameters
Xmax [1.5, 150, 0.45, 12, 1.875, 450, 0.05, 0.1, 1.5,
150];
Xmin [0.5, 50, 0.15, 4, 0.625, 150, 0.001, 0.025, 0.5, 50]
14

Appendix D: optimised controller parameters

kp1 0.6 pu, ki1 80.4 s21, kp2 0.27 pu, ki2 5.1 s21,
kp3 1.48 pu, ki3 219 s21, kp4 kp2 , ki4 ki2
kpdg 14.4 pu, kidg 64.8 s21,
kpg 0.73 pu, kig 131 s21
IET Gener. Transm. Distrib., Vol. 1, No. 5, September 2007