Pramod Jain; Wind Energy Engineering, ISBN:

9780071843843, Mc Graw Hill, NY, USA, 2016

Chapter 8
Basics of Electricity and Generators

Copyright © The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc. Permission required for reproduction or display.
Introduction
• In this chapter, the generator side of wind
turbines is described. The aerodynamics
chapters alluded to the notion that the type
of generator has a significant impact on the
efficiency of the turbine rotor. These aspects
are covered in this chapter. The chapter
starts with basic principles of
electromagnetism followed by basic
principles of alternating current and basic
principles of electrical machines.
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Basic Principles of Electromagnetism
• A current carrying circular conductor that is cylindrically
wound in the form of a coil produces a magnetic field that is
parallel to the axis of the cylinder. When a core of
ferromagnetic material is placed inside the coil, then the
magnetic field is magnified and this is called an
electromagnet. In electrical machines cylindrically wound
coils are used in the stator and sometimes in the rotor.
These three basic principles of electromagnetism are
illustrated in Fig. 10-1 and are applicable to generators.

• .
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Faraday’s Law of Induction
• The voltage induced in a conductor is proportional to
the rate of change of lines of magnetic field that pass
through the conductor. There are several ways to cut
magnetic field. The obvious one is to move the
conductor in such a manner that magnetic field is cut.
• A second method is to fix the conductor, but to
generate a magnetic field that changes over time; the
changing magnetic field provides the relative
movement that leads to cutting of magnetic field.
• A third method is to fix the conductor and move the
magnet or electromagnet, thereby creating the relative
movement.
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Lenz Law

• Induced voltage from Faraday’s law will

cause a current to flow in a closed circuit
in such a direction that the magnetic field,
which is caused by the current, will oppose
the change of magnetic field that induced
the voltage.

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Lorenz Law or Biot-Savart Law

• When a current carrying conductor is

placed in a magnetic field in such a
manner that the current is perpendicular to
the magnetic field, then a force is exerted
on the conductor. The magnitude of the
force is product of flux density, current,
and length of conductor. The direction of
the force is determined by the left-hand
rule.
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Basic Principles of Alternating
Current

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• In this circuit, current and voltage are in phase.
Next, consider a pure inductive circuit with no
resistance in which the current and voltage are at
90◦ phase difference. A pure inductor is closely
approximated by winding a copper coil on a
laminated iron core. When alternating current is
passed through such a circuit, an alternating
magnetic field is created. This magnetic field cuts
the copper coil and, therefore, creates a self-
induced electro-motive force (EMF). The self-
induced EMF opposes the applied EMF. If i = im
sin ωt is the current, then the self-induced EMF e
is:
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• The power alternates between positive
and negative at twice the frequency.When
the current is rising (ωt ∈ (0, π /2 )), circuit
supplies power to create a magnetic field,
when the current is falling (ωt ∈ ( π /2 ,
π)), magnetic field decreases. This
decreasing magnetic field supplies power
to the circuit.

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• The power delivered to the circuit is lower
than a pure resistance circuit. This is
because the voltage and current are not in
phase. Therefore, the sum of the product
of the two quantities over time is lower.
• cos ϕ is called the power factor: the ratio
of the true power and the apparent power.
Three phase alternating current is current
in three conductors with a phase
difference of 120◦.
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Basic Principles of Electrical
Machines
• Electricity generators are rotating electrical
machines that have a stator and a rotor.
Stator is the stationary part of the
generator. This is the outer cylindrical
casing of the generator that contains
three, six, or other multiple of three
numbers of coils. In rare configurations,
the stator may be the inner cylinder.

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• The resultant magnetic field has constant magnitude and
its direction changes with time with an angular velocity of
ω.
• This property is crucial to the operation of generators.
Stators contain three coils that are arranged such that the
axis of the coils are 120◦ apart. When a three-phase
alternating current is fed to the coils, then a rotating
magnetic field is generated. The magnetic field created by
the stator is akin to a spinning permanent magnet placed
on the axis of the stator with N-S pointing radially and the
axis of the spin coincides with the axis of the stator.
• The rotor is the moving part of the generator. This is
connected to the turbine rotor to which the blades are
attached.
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Conversion of Mechanical to
Electrical Power
• A wind turbine captures linear kinetic
energy of wind and converts it into
rotational kinetic energy. This rotational
kinetic energy from a turbine is transferred
to an electrical generator either directly or
through a gearbox. The electrical
generator then converts the mechanical
energy into electrical energy.

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• How is the mechanical torque that is
applied to the rotor of the generator
balanced by an opposing torque? If the
torque is not balanced, the rotor will
accelerate out of control.
• . The answer is: The balancing torque is
provided by two mechanisms. Remember
that the stator creates a rotating magnetic
field with angular speed ω and the rotor is
rotating with an angular speed of ω.

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• In a synchronous generator, the magnetic pull
between the rotor and stator provides the
balancing torque.
• In an asynchronous generator, balancing torque
is provided by the tangential force experienced
by current carrying conductors in the rotor in the
presence of magnetic field created by the
stator. For the torque to be generated, the
speed of rotor has to be slightly higher than the
speed of the stator’s magnetic field.

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Synchronous Generator
• Rotor of a synchronous generator is either
permanent magnet or DC-excited
electromagnet. The simplest generator is a
two-pole (one north pole and one south pole)
rotor with the stator connected to the grid.
The grid supplies the voltage and frequency,
meaning the voltage and frequency of the
stator circuit are fixed. The grid also supplies
the current to energize the stator. The stator
produces a rotating magnetic field of angular
speed ω.
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• If a compass were placed at the center, it
would rotate with the magnetic field. Instead
of a compass, the rotor has a permanent or
electro magnet that moves with the stator
magnetic field with angular speed ω. At zero
load, the speed of rotation of the rotor is the
same (no relative speed between rotor and
stator) and the phase difference is zero
(north pole of stator generated magnetic field
is aligned with the south pole of the rotor).

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• From electric circuit standpoint, the grid
supplies the terminal voltage to the stator
and current . The rotating magnetic field of
the rotor (which is synchronized with the
rotating magnetic field of the stator) cuts
conductor in the stator and, therefore,
induces EMF in the stator coils.

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• Perfect alignment of stator and rotor poles
means that the angular speed of stator’s
magnetic field is the same as the angular
speed of rotation of the rotor and the
opposite poles of stator and rotor face
each other (radial alignment).

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• Note that even when no power is delivered to
the grid by the generator, the grid is still
supplying current to energize the magnetic field
of the stator. In this case, grid current drawn (by
the stator of the generator) is out of phase with
grid voltage. Therefore, no “real” power is drawn
from the grid.
• However, the grid delivers “reactive” power to
the stator of the generator. Therefore, over one
complete cycle, the net power delivered to or
drawn from the grid is zero.

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Variable-Speed Permanent Magnet
Synchronous Generators
• The inherent nature of wind energy demands
variable speed generators. The reason may be
seen in the torque-rotor speed curves for
different wind speeds. A constant-speed
generator is able to capture energy most
efficiently only for single wind speed.
• A variable speed turbine that can change rotor
speed such that the turbine is operating at peak
power for all wind speeds (below the rated wind
speed) will yield higher energy output. This is
the motivation for the movement toward variable
speed generators. 26
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Direct-Drive Synchronous Generator
• Enercon popularized this type of
generator. Enercon’s E66 1.5 MW
generator4 has 72 poles and
produces six-phase power, which is
rectified to DC. This DC current is fed
to the rotor and to an inverter. In
order to accommodate the large
number of poles, the rotor is large.

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Asynchronous Generators
• Asynchronous generators are also called
induction generators. The principles are
similar to a transformer in which the
primary coils around one side of the core
generate magnetic field. This changing
magnetic field produced EMF in the
secondary coil on the other side of the
core. Here, energy is transferred from one
level of AC voltage to a different level of
AC voltage at the same frequency.
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• In an induction generator, instead of a
solid core, there is an air gap through
which the magnetic field travels. The
primary core is in the stator and the
secondary core is in the rotor.
• Like synchronous generator, a rotating
magnetic field is created by connecting the
stator to the grid.

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Variable Speed
• Variable-speed generators are more efficient
at capturing wind energy over a wider range
of wind speeds. Therefore, the utility-scale
wind turbine market has moved to this type
of generator. Three types of generators
have become popular in the recent years:
Double-fed induction generator (DFIG),
direct-drive synchronous generator (DDSG)
with DC excitation, and direct-drive
permanent magnet (DDPM) generator

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