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A transformer-less compact and light wind turbine generating system for

offshore wind farms

Conference Paper · December 2012

DOI: 10.1109/PECon.2012.6450285

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 2012 IEEE International Conference on Power and Energy (PECon), 2-5 December 2012, Kota Kinabalu Sabah, Malaysia

A Transformer-Less Compact and Light Wind

Turbine Generating System for Offshore Wind Farms

Md Rabiul Islam, Youguang Guo and Jianguo Zhu

Centre for Electrical Machines and Power Electronics
University of Technology Sydney (UTS)
Sydney, Australia
Md.Islam@uts.edu.au and Rabiulbd@hotmail.com

Abstract—Offshore wind turbines are distributed in a wide area power is fed to onshore local grid through an offshore or
where the power is generated usually at low voltage levels of onshore substation. The voltage level of an offshore wind
380~690 V. To reduce electrical power transmission losses, a low- generator is usually in the range of 380~690 V. Therefore,
frequency transformer is placed inside the nacelle of the offshore large current transfer through the internal grid will increase the
wind turbine to step-up the voltage up to the voltage levels of
size and number of cables and will cause the losses (I2R),
11~33 kV. The heave weight and large size of the step-up
transformer significantly increase the weight and volume of the voltage drop as well as costs.
nacelle. These penalties are critical in offshore applications,
where cost of installation and regular maintenance are extremely TABLE I. OFFSHORE WIND FARMS DATA
high. As an alternative approach to achieve a compact and light Power Distance Number Land
offshore wind turbine a medium-voltage converter using series Wind Farms Capacity to Shore of Covered
connected H-bridge multilevel converter topology is proposed in (MW) (km) Turbines km2
this paper. The transformer-less approach thus leads to a Barrow 108 7 30 10.00
compact and environmentally friendly design, which can save Gunfleet Sands 172 7 48 17.50
large amount of installation, running and maintenance costs of Horns Rev 160 15 80 20.00
offshore wind turbines. This paper mainly focuses on design and Horns Rev 2 200 27 91 35.00
Lynn and Inner D. 194 9 54 20.00
simulation of 33 kV offshore wind turbine generating system.
Ormonde 150 10 30 8.70
Princess Amalia 120 23 60 14.00
Keywords-medium-voltage converter; compact and light wind
turbine; offshore wind farms.

I. INTRODUCTION
Usually offshore winds tend to flow at higher speeds than
onshore winds, which allows turbine to produce more
electricity, as the possible energy produced from the wind is
directly proportional to the cube of the wind speed. Moreover,
wind farms cover large areas of land. The land area covered
by a 3.6 MW turbine can be almost 0.37 km2; such that 54
turbines would cover about 20 km2 of land area. Table I shows
the land covered by some offshore wind farms [1]-[5].
Therefore, offshore based wind farms have been gaining Figure 1. Global cumulative offshore wind farms installed capacity.
popularity in the past few years. According to statistical data
the annual offshore wind farm installed capacity in 2008, 2009 In order to overcome this problem a step-up transformer
and 2010 were 374, 584 and 999 MW respectively; almost (e.g. 11~33 kV) is usually placed inside the nacelle of the
doubled in each year [6]. Global cumulative installed capacity offshore wind turbine generating system. This heavy and
of offshore wind farm is shown in Fig. 1. It is expected that the bulky step-up transformer significantly increases the weight
global offshore installed capacity will increase to and volume of nacelle as well as increases the mechanical
approximately 20 GW by 2015 and rise sharply to 104 GW by stress of the tower. These penalties are critical in offshore
2025. According to the Global Wind Energy Council and renewable energy applications, where the cost of installation
Green Peace International estimations it is possible to mitigate and regular maintenance are extremely high. Hence, a
20% of global electricity demand with wind energy [7]. The transformer-less, medium-voltage converter based nacelle
existing offshore wind farm consists of in average 50 wind would be an attractive technology for the future offshore wind
turbines installed in offshore area (more than 7 km from the turbines.
shore), connected with an internal grid. This offshore wind

978-1-4673-5019-8/12/$31.00 ©2012 IEEE 605

 2012 IEEE International Conference on Power and Energy (PECon), 2-5 December 2012, Kota Kinabalu Sabah, Malaysia

II. CLASSICAL OFFSHORE WIND TURBINE SYSTEM
A. Classical Construction of Offshore Wind Turbine
Nowadays in offshore wind farms, it is common to
assemble a step-up transformer in the nacelle with other
equipments such as generator and power converter, at a height
of about 80 meters. Fig. 2 shows the basic architectural block
diagram of horizontal axis wind turbine [8], where pointers 1 to
18 indicate the blade, blade support, pitch angle actuator, hub,
spinner, main support, main shaft, aircraft warning lights,
gearbox, mechanical brakes, hydraulic cooling devices,
generator, power converter, transformer, anemometers, frame
of the nacelle, supporting tower and yaw driving devices
respectively.
fire safety; the flash point of mineral-oil dielectric is about 150
°C; whereas silicone fluid’s flash point is about 360 ° C.
C. Classical Offshore Wind Farms
A single line diagram of the most common offshore wind
farm system is shown in Fig. 3. The typical weights of the
different major parts of offshore wind turbines from 2 to 5 MW
are shown in Table II [11], [13]. The nacelle houses the
generator, gearbox, power converter, transformer and
monitoring and control equipment. The tower provides support
to the rotor and nacelle. Therefore, the tower diameter and
strength depend on the weight of the nacelle and expected wind
loads.

Figure 2. Main components of horizontal axis wind turbine.

Figure 3. Single-line diagram of classical offshore wind farms.
B. Step-Up Transformers for Wind Turbines
The tower is normally held by heavy foundation to ensure
The rated voltage of commonly used wind turbine to withstand the overturning moment created from the turbine.
transformer is 11~33/0.69 kV. There are several industries The foundation size of a 2.3 MW wind turbine is 314 m2 and
developing transformers specially for renewable energy approximate weight is 2000 tons or more [14].
applications. ASEA brown boveri (ABB) has been delivering
worldwide vacuum cast coil transformers and liquid-filled TABLE II. WEIGHT OF COMMONLY USED OFFSHORE TURBINES
transformers for wind farm applications. Cast coil dry type
Turbine Capacity Tower Rotor Nacelle
transformers are non-flamable and moisture proof. They (MW) (tons) (tons) (tons)
feature a solid isolation system which is discharge free. The Vestas V80 2.00 130 37 67
volume and weight of a 2.5 MVA vacuum cast coil transformer Siemens 2.3-93 2.30 134 60 82
are about 8.5 m3 and 6200 kg respectively and no-load and full- Siemens 3.6-107 3.60 180 95 125
load losses are 5.8 kW and 25 kW respectively [9]. However, Repower 5M 5.00 225 120 300
dry type transformers can be sensitive to water, micro-cracks,
temperature variations, and pollution which can block cooling The costs associated with developing, engineering,
ducts. A liquid-filled 2 MVA transformer is about 5.7 m3 in equipment procurement and delivering and constructing an
volume and 4530 kg in weight with 870 kg of liquid for offshore wind farm can be defined as the total capital cost.
cooling and insulation [10]. The no-load and full-load losses According to energy research group report the first two
are approximately 3.2 kW and 21 kW respectively. Pauwels activities contribute about 10% and the third contributes
developed SLIM transformer which is compact in size and no 40~60% of the total capital cost [13]. Construction involves
load losses are typically half of that of a dry-type transformer. fabricating, assembly and installation and contributes 20~40%
A 33/0.69 kV, 2.6 MVA SLIM transformer has no-load loss of of the total cost. The installation cost is a fractional component
2.6 kW and full-load loss of 22.5 kW [11]. Although the SLIM of capital cost and it is estimated at 10 to 30% of the total cost
transformer is compact compared with conventional as available in literature [15], [16]. In average approximately
transformer but still it is bulky and heavy for offshore 20% of the capital costs are associated with installation. The
applications. The volume and weight of a 20/0.69 kV, 2.3 estimated capital cost of a few offshore wind farms is shown
MVA Bio-SLIM transformer are about 4 m3 and 5040 kg in Table III. The total capital cost was about 2.2 million
respectively [12]. The use of about 900 kg or more silicone US$/MW in 2005 and in 2009 it was almost 3.5 million
fluid as coolant in these transformers ensures a high degree of US$/MW.

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 2012 IEEE International Conference on Power and Energy (PECon), 2-5 December 2012, Kota Kinabalu Sabah, Malaysia

TABLE III. CAPITAL COSTS OF OFFSHORE WIND FARMS

Wind Capacity Cost (Million) Cost/MW* Year (iv) compact and light overall turbine, and (v) simple
farm (MW) Cost Currency online installation and low maintenance cost.
Kentish F. 90 105 GBP 2.14 2005 The proposed technique, just replacing the low-voltage
OWEZ 108 217 Euro 2.54 2006 (380~690 V) converter and step-up transformer by a medium-
Lillgrund 110 1800 SEK 2.38 2007
Robin Rigg 180 420 Euro 3.62 2008 voltage 33 kV converter as shown in Fig. 5 may reduce the
Rhyl Flats 90 190 GBP 3.47 2009 size and weight of wind turbine. The proposed turbine based
Gunfleet S. 172 3900 DKK 3.75 2010 offshore wind farm is shown in Fig. 6. This variable
* Approximate cost in million US$/MW; exchange rates are chosen as respective years magnitude and variable frequency output from generator is
first converted to DC through an AC/DC converter. This DC
Tower cost dominates the total cost of the wind turbine voltage can be converted to high-frequency AC by an H-
usually representing 26% of the total cost, where as the bridge converter. The high-frequency transformer-link is used
generator represents only 3% of the total turbine cost. Wind to generate the isolated balanced multiple sources from a
turbine component cost as a percentage of total cost is shown single source. These isolated and balanced sources can feed
in Fig. 4 [8]. The bulky and heavy step-up transformer adds the power to the respective H-bridge cell of the SCHB
significantly to the mechanical loading of the tower although multilevel converter through dedicated AC/DC converter. The
new designs aim to reduce the transformer size and weight. details block diagram of the proposed system is shown in Fig.
Reduction of mechanical loading means enormous saving of 7.
tower construction and installation costs.

Figure 4. Turbine component cost as a percentance of total cost.

Figure 5. Medium-voltage converter based wind turbine system.

III. PROPOSED SYSTEM FOR OFFSHORE WIND FARMS

In this paper, a medium-voltage series connected H-bridge
(SCHB) multilevel converter based system is proposed to
eliminate the heavy and bulky step-up transformer, which is
desirable for both onshore and offshore wind turbines. The
high-frequency link is used to generate the isolated balanced
multiple DC supplies for the SCHB converter from a single
low-voltage commercially available classical generator. The
advantages of this proposed wind turbine generating system
are: (i) requiring only one classical generator, (ii) inherent DC
link voltage balancing due to single DC supply, (iii) direct gird
connection with medium-voltage and high-level converter, Figure 6. Medium-voltage converter based offshore wind farm.

meas
I AC
meas
VAC meas
I DC
meas
meas
VDC
Ω gen

conv , ref
Pgrid

conv , ref
Qgrid meas
Qgrid
meas
Pgrid
meas
Pgrid

ref
Pgrid

Figure 7. Detailed block-diagram of medium-voltage converter based wind turbine system.

607
 2012 IEEE International Conference on Power and Energy (PECon), 2-5 December 2012, Kota Kinabalu Sabah, Malaysia

pulse width modulation (SPWM) scheme.

IV. DESIGN AND SIMULATION
The minimum equivalent DC-link voltage necessary to TABLE IV. DEVICE VOLTAGE UTILIZATION FACTOR WITH DIFFERENT
LEVEL NUMBER
achieve an output voltage of 33 kV can be calculated from
Level Rated DVUF
Vdc (min) = 2 × Vll ( rms ) (1) Number
Vcom
Device kV
Vcom@100FIT
%
15 3467 6.5 3600 96
= 2 × 33000V 17 3034 6.5 3600 85
= 46,669V 19 2697 6.5 3600 75
21 2427 6.5 3600 68
To determine the nominal DC-link voltage of the converter, a 23 2206 4.5 2250 98
voltage reserve of 4 % is assumed, i.e. 25 2022 4.5 2250 90
Vdc ( nom ) = 1.04 × 46,669V (2) 27
29
1867
1734
4.5
3.3
2250
1800
83
96
= 48,536V 31 1618 3.3 1800 90
33 1517 3.3 1800 84
In terms of semiconductor technology development, a 35 1428 3.3 1800 79
continuous race to develop higher-voltage and higher-current 37 1348 3.3 1800 75
power semiconductors, e.g. the insulated gate bipolar 39 1277 3.3 1800 71
transistors (IGBTs), for utilization in high power systems still 41 1214 3.3 1800 65
43 1156 2.5 1200 96
goes on. The highest voltage rating of commercially available
45 1103 2.5 1200 92
IGBT is 6.5 kV; suitable for 2.5 kV or lower voltage converter 47 1055 2.5 1200 88
systems. Although higher-voltage devices such as 3.3, 4.5 and 49 1011 2.5 1200 84
6.5 kV IGBTs are available in the market but, still they are 51 971 2.5 1200 81
costly as shown in Fig. 8 [17], [18]. The lower-voltage 53 934 2.5 1200 78
devices, such as 0.6, 0.9, 1.2, 1.7 and 2.5 kV IGBTs are not 55 899 1.7 900 100
only mature in technology but also cheaper. On the other
This may reduce the size of the input and output filter
hand, the series-parallel connection of low voltage rating
requirements. Converter with possible level numbers of 15,
semiconductors can be a cost effective solution for high-
17, 19, 21………55 are simulated in MATLAB/Simulink
voltage applications.
environment and THDs are calculated. Figs. 10 ~ 14 shows
the three-phase output voltage of 33 kV converters and
respective voltage frequency spectrums are shown in Figs. 15
~ 19.

Figure 8. Price of IGBTs at 400 A.

Each H-bridge cell communication voltage of a 15 level

converter is 3,467 V which may be supported by the 6.5 kV Figure 9. THD of 33 kV converters.
IGBT. Thus at least 15 levels converter is required to design
The THD of output voltages, number of arithmetic and
33 kV systems. The device voltage utilization factors (DVUF);
logic operations (ALOs) for switching and control sections
ratio of commutation voltage of respective commutation cells
and cost of semiconductors are calculated as listed in Table V.
(Vcom) and device commutation voltage for a device reliability
The number of ALOs is used to compare the complexity of the
of 100 failures in time (FIT) due to cosmic radiation
converters. The normalized index values are calculated as
(Vcom@100FIT), are calculated as listed in Table IV. Table IV
shown in Table VI from Table V by using
shows that only a few converters like, 15, 23, 29, 43 and 55
levels converters may have the better voltage utilization factor y − ymin
index = (3)
i.e. cost effective design. ymax − ymin
To implement harmonic control it is essential to use a filter
where y is the given value, ymin is the minimum value and ymax
coil, which also increases the system complexity and cost. The
is the maximum value on a respective column. Based on
output voltage of the converter could be improved by
Table VI a graph is plotted as shown in Fig. 19; giving a clear
increasing the level numbers of the converter. Fig. 9 shows the
idea about the selection of level number.
total harmonic distortion (THD) of output voltages with sine

608
 2012 IEEE International Conference on Power and Energy (PECon), 2-5 December 2012, Kota Kinabalu Sabah, Malaysia

4
x 10 0.03

Normalized Amplitude
5
0.02
Voltage (V)

0
0.01

-5 0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5

0.01 0.02 0.03 0.04
Frequency (Hz) 5
Time (s) x 10
Figure 10. Output voltage of 15 level converter. Figure 15. Frequency spectrum of 15 level converter.

x 10
4 0.03

Normalized Amplitude
5
0.02
Voltage (V)

0
0.01

-5 0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5

0.01 0.015 0.02 0.025 0.03 0.035 0.04
Frequency (Hz) 5
Time (s) x 10
Figure 11. Output voltage of 23 level converter. Figure 16. Frequency spectrum of 23 level converter.

x 10
4 0.03
5 Normalized Amplitude
0.02
Voltage (V)

0
0.01

-5 0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5

0.01 0.015 0.02 0.025 0.03 0.035 0.04
Frequency (Hz) 5
Time (s) x 10
Figure 12. Output voltage of 29 level converter. Figure 17. Frequency spectrum of 29 level converter.

x 10
4 0.03
Normalized Amplitude

5
0.02
Voltage (V)

0
0.01

-5 0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5

0.01 0.015 0.02 0.025 0.03 0.035 0.04
Frequency (Hz) 5
Time (s) x 10
Figure 13. Output voltage of 43 level converter. Figure 18. Frequency spectrum of 43 level converter.

x 10
4 0.03
Normalized Amplitude

5
0.02
Voltage (V)

0
0.01

-5 0 0.5 1 1.5 2 2.5

0.01 0.015 0.02 0.025 0.03 0.035 0.04
Frequency (Hz) 5
Time (s) x 10
Figure 14. Output voltage of 55 level converter. Figure 19. Frequency spectrum of 55 level converter.

609
 2012 IEEE International Conference on Power and Energy (PECon), 2-5 December 2012, Kota Kinabalu Sabah, Malaysia

The control complexity increases linearly with the number [2] Observator (June 2012), “ Project description,” [Online] Available at:
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23
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