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Capability chart of a Doubly Fed Induction Generation based on its ratings and
stability margin

Article · January 2010

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UPEC2010
31st Aug - 3rd Sept 2010

Capability Chart of a Doubly Fed Induction

Generation based on its ratings and stability margin
A.P. Tennakoon J.B. Ekanayake A. Atputharajah S.G. Abeyratne
Ceylon Electricity Board Cardiff University, University of Peradeniya, University of Peradeniya,
Sri Lanka United Kingdom Sri Lanka Sri Lanka
ceprotmc@yahoo.com ekanayakeJ@cardiff.ac.uk atpu@ee.pdn.ac.lk sunil@ee.pdn.ac.lk

Abstract: The limitations with regard to the capability of

Doubly Fed Induction Generator based wind turbines are
discussed. The importance of considering the stability margin
when constructing the capability curve was highlighted. Then
the total power output vs the reactive power output of the
Wound Rotor
turbine within its capabilities was obtained. A case study was
Induction Generator
carried out to discuss the capability of a wind farm with regard
to the Great Britain grid code requirements.

Index Terms-
DFIG-Doubly Fed Induction Generator
GB-Great Britain
NGC-National Grid Code
Vrd-D axis rotor injected voltage
Vrq-Q axis rotor injected voltage
VSC-Voltage Source Converter
I. INTRODUCTION
Grid connection codes define the requirements for the
connection of generation and loads to an electrical network
which ensures efficient, safe and economical operation of the
transmission and/or distribution systems. In the case of wind
farm connections, the connection codes normally apply at the
point of connection of the wind farm.
The grid codes require the control of the voltage and also
the absorption or generation of the reactive power, in
accordance with the needs of the power system. The
operating point, for steady state reactive power exchange at a
given active power output, is defined by the grid codes. In
order to assess the capacity of a wind farm, wind farm
planners need to carry out extensive studies at the connection
point. This can be done by varying the wind turbine active
and reactive power outputs within the capability curve of each
wind turbine. Therefore obtaining the capability chart of a
wind turbine is very important.[4, 6, 7]
C1 C2
Crowbar
ac / dc dc / ac
Controller
Fig 1. DFIG Configuration [1]
converter typically consisting of two ac/dc IGBT based
voltage source converters (VSCs), linked by a dc bus. A
typical configuration of a DFIG based wind turbine is shown
in Fig 1. The converter system enables variable speed
operation of the wind turbine. Depending upon the rotational
speed of the DFIG, power can be delivered to the grid through
the stator, and the rotor, while the rotor can also absorb
power. If the DFIG runs at sub-synchronous speed, the rotor
absorbs power from the rotor converter. That means a
fraction of the stator power enters back to the rotor circuit. In
contrast, if the DFIG runs at super-synchronous speed, the
rotor produces power and power is delivered to the grid via
the stator and rotor converter circuits.

II. CAPABILITY CHART OF DFIG BASED WIND TURBINES
An induction generator, with a wound rotor using slip rings
to take current into or out of the rotating secondary winding,
is used for the DFIG based wind turbine. The rotor winding
is fed through a back-to-back variable frequency power
The capability of a DFIG wind turbine is restricted by the
limitations of the wound rotor induction machine reactive
power requirements. In addition, a DFIG operation is further
constrained by the requirement of maintaining an adequate
stability margin, which is defined as the deference between
 Active Power for Variation of Vrd at Vrq=-0.01p.u.
0
-1
-2
POW E R (p.u.)
-3
-4
-5
-6
-0.2 -0.1 0 0.1
slip
Fig 2. Torque slip curves for different Vrd injection with Vrq = -0.01p.u.[2]
the pull out torque and the operating torque at the operating
speed (see Fig 2).
The operating point of the DFIG is controlled to follow the
maximum power extraction curve. From Fig 2, it can be
seen that the stability margin reduces at super synchronous
speeds [2].
In order to obtain the capability curve, the DFIG steady
state model shown in Fig 3 was simulated in Matlab. At
speeds ranging from 0.5 pu to 1.2 pu, the behavior of the
DFIG was studied at different stator reactive power injection
(0 to 0.95 pu in steps of 0.2 pu) and absorption (0 to -0.95 pu
in steps of -0.2 pu) levels.
Rs jωsLss
jωs Lm
Vs
Fig 3. Steady state model of DFIG
During the simulations the following limits were always
maintained by reducing the total output power of the DFIG:
a) Rotor active power was maintained within 0.3 pu.
b) Stator current was maintained below 1 pu.
c) Stability margin was maintained above 0.1 pu.
A vector control strategy, where the rotor current is split
into the d and q axis components, was used to control the
DFIG. The q-axis component is controlled in order to
regulate the machine reactive power output, while the d-axis
component is controlled in order to regulate the electrical
torque thus the active power output [3, 8, 9].
Fig shows the variation of stator active power, stator
OPTIMUM POWER reactive power, rotor active power, rotor reactive power, total
CURVE active power, total reactive power, stator current and rotor
current when the d axis rotor injection (to change the active
OPERATING POINT power) and the q axis rotor injection (to change the reactive
power) were changed in steps. Initially the slip was set to 0.5
and the stator reactive power output was set to 0.95 pu. The q
STABILITY MARGIN axis rotor injection was varied in order to achieve this setting.
While maintaining the q axis rotor current for 0.95 pu stator
reactive power, the d axis current was varied to have 1 pu
stator current. This was done as long as the rotor power was
under 0.3 pu. Hence when the rotor power reaches 0.3 pu
limit or the stator current reaches 1 pu, the stator output
power was limited. This procedure was repeated by varying
0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5
the slip up to -0.2 in steps of 0.01. This process was carried
out for stator reactive power outputs set to +0.95 pu to -0.95
pu in steps of 0.2 pu. For example, for the 2nd top most curve
(black dotted) in Fig (b), the rotor injection was set to obtain
0.95 pu stator reactive power (+ve means absorption) and the
slip was changed from -0.2 pu to 0.5 pu and all powers and
currents were obtained. Other curves from top to bottom in
Fig (b) correspond to stator reactive power of -0.95 to +0.95
pu in steps of 0.2 pu.
It could be seen from Fig 4(c) and Fig 4(g), the stator
current has bounded by the rotor power limit at zero stator
reactive power at slips beyond 0.293. Further at stator
reactive powers of 0.2 pu and -0.2 pu, the rotor power reaches
the limit at slips beyond 0.299 pu. For stator reactive powers
of 0.4 pu and -0.4 pu, the rotor power reaches the limit at the
slips beyond 0.32 pu and for stator reactive powers of 0.6 pu
and -0.6 pu, it reaches the limit at the slips beyond 0.367 pu.
For other stator reactive powers below -0.8 pu and above 0.8
pu, the stator current is not limited by the rotor power as it has
not reached 0.3 pu (see Fig (c)).
jωsLrr Rr /s The stability margin was also checked at super-
synchronous speeds (slip<0.1) and kept above 0.1 pu. Stator
(Vrd+jVrq) /s active power output was reduced to keep the stability margin
above 0.1 pu. As shown in Fig (b), the value of stator
reactive power has to be decreased from slip values of -0.08
to -0.2, to maintain the required stability margin (0.1 pu).
It is seen from Fig 4(h) that the rotor current has reached
1.2 pu although the power is maintained under 0.3 pu. This is
because the rotor to stator turns ratio in the DFIG has been
considered as 1:1. The current could be less when the turns
ratio is 1:x (where x < 1).
Fig shows the capability curve obtained by Fig (e) and Fig
4(f). As the active power output could not be maintained
beyond -0.1 slip due to the reduction in the stability margin
this region is not considered for the capability curve.
 Ps (pu)

Ptotal (pu)
0 0

P to t a l p .u .
P s p .u .

-0.5 -0.5

-1
-1
-0.2 -0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 -0.2 -0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5
slip slip
(a) Stator active power (e) Total active power
1
1
0.5

Q to ta l p .u .
0.5

Qtotal (pu)
Qs (pu)
Q s p .u .

0 0

-0.5 -0.5

-1 -1
-0.2 -0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 -0.2 -0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5
slip slip
0.4
(b) Stator reactive power (f) slip
Total reactive power

Q=0.95,-0.95
0.3 1
Pr (pu)

Qs=-0.8,+0.8
Is (pu)
Is p .u .
P r p .u .

0.2

0.1
Qs=-0.95,+0.95 Q=0
0.5
0

-0.1 -0.2 -0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5

-0.2 -0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5
slip
slip
(c) Rotor active power (g) Total stator current

0.6 Q= + 0.95 1.21.2

1
Qr (pu)

Ir p .u .

1.0
0.4 0.8
Q r p .u .

0.8
Ir (pu)

0.2 0.6
0.6
0
0.4
0.4
-0.2 Q= - 0.95 -0.2 -0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5
-0.2 -0.1 0 0.1 0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 slip
slip (h) Total rotor current
(d) Rotor reactive power
Fig 4. Variation of stator and rotor active power, reactive power and currents
with slip
 0.8

0.6 132/66kV
Stator Reactive power delivered p.u.

0.45 90 MVA
0.4 10%, X/R=10
0.4 0.2
0.2
0.35 0.25 0.15 -0.05
0
0.3 0.0
0.1
-0.2
0.05
-0.4 185 mm2 Cable
10 km
-0.6 R=0.1 Ω/km
-0.1
X=0.132 Ω/km
-0.8 C=0.16 µF/km
0.2 0.3 0.4 0.5 0.6 0.7 0.8 0.9 1
Total Power delivered p.u.

Fig 5. Capability curve at 1 pu wind farm bus voltage

To 10 To 10 To 10
2 MW 2 MW 2 MW
III. A CASE STUDY turbines turbines turbines
In this case study, the reactive power requirement of a
DFIG based wind farm to fulfill GB grid codes [4] is Distance between turbines 1 km
185 mm2 Cable
considered. The GB grid codes states that all wind farms R=0.13 Ω/km
must be capable of supplying rated MW output at any point X=0.11 Ω/km
between 0.95 power factor lagging and 0.95 power factor
leading. With all plants in service, the reactive power Fig 7. Sample network
requirements as defined in the GB grid codes at lagging and
leading power factor are shown in Fig . These reactive power The wind farm was simulated using the load flow computer
limits will be reduced pro rata to the amount of plant in package IPSA. Fig shows the active and reactive power at the
service. point of connection of the wind farm for different turbine
operating points at three values of wind farm bus voltages
In order to demonstrate the capability of a wind farm that (0.95, 1.0 and 1.05 pu). The solid lines show the Grid Code
employs wind turbines having a capability curve shown in Fig reactive power requirements (Fig translated for the wind
5, the simple wind farm network shown in Fig 7 was used. farm). The shaded area indicates an area where the wind farm
cannot fulfill the reactive power requirements as specified in
the GB grid codes.

70

60
Wind Farm
Vsd=1.0 pu
50
Active Power MW

Grid Code
40
Wind Farm
Vsd=0.95 pu
30
Wind Farm
Vsd=1.05 pu
20

Point A is equivalent (in MVAr) to: 0.95 leading P.F. at Rated MW output 10
Point B is equivalent (in MVAr) to: 0.95 lagging P. F. at Rated MW output
Point C is equivalent (in MVAr) to: -5% of Rated MW output 0
Point D is equivalent (in MVAr) to: +5% of Rated MW output -100 -50 0 50
Reactive Power MVar
Point E is equivalent (in MVAr) to: -12% of Rated MW output
Fig 6. NGC plc reactive power requirement [4]
Fig 8. Active and reactive power at the point of connection of the wind farm
 IV. CONCLUSION
The development of the capability chart of the DFIG has
been discussed in the paper. This was done under limitations
of rotor power, stator current and the stability margin of the
wound rotor induction machine used for the DFIG wind
farms.
With the developed capability chart a case study was
carried out for a wind farm connected power system. The GB
grid code was used to study how the wind farm would fulfill
the grid code requirements at the point of connection with the
grid. Three different scenarios at 0.95 pu, 1 pu and 1.05 pu
voltage at the wind farm bus were studied. It was found that
there is an area in the maximum power region that the grid
code requirements could not be fulfilled. It is also seen that
this area could be reduced by increasing the wind farm bus
voltage.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT
The authors acknowledge the National Science Foundation
of Sri Lanka for providing financial support through the
Research Grant RG/2006/W&E/01.
Second author would like to acknowledge the Low Carbon
Research Institute of the UK for part funding of some work.
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