The intentional yaw misalignment of leading, upwind turbines in a wind farm, termed wake steering, has demonstrated potential as a collective control approach for wind farm power maximization. The optimal control strategy and the resulting effect of wake steering on wind farm power production are in part dictated by the power degradation of the upwind yaw misaligned wind turbines. In the atmospheric boundary layer, the wind speed and direction may vary significantly over the wind turbine rotor area, depending on atmospheric conditions and stability, resulting in freestream turbine power production which is asymmetric as a function of the direction of yaw misalignment and which varies during the diurnal cycle. In this study, we propose a model for the power production of a wind turbine in yaw misalignment based on aerodynamic blade elements, which incorporates the effects of wind speed and direction changes over the turbine rotor area in yaw misalignment. The proposed model can be used for the modeling of the angular velocity, aerodynamic torque, and power production of an arbitrary yaw misaligned wind turbine based on the incident velocity profile, wind turbine aerodynamic properties, and turbine control system. A field experiment is performed using multiple utility-scale wind turbines to characterize the power production of yawed freestream operating turbines depending on the wind conditions, and the model is validated using the experimental data. The resulting power production of a yaw misaligned variable speed wind turbine depends on a nonlinear interaction between the yaw misalignment, the atmospheric conditions, and the wind turbine control system.

Improving grid connection of wind farms is a relevant issue to be addressed, especially for fixed-speed wind turbines. Certain elements, such as FACTS (Flexible AC Transmission Systems), are able to perform voltage and reactive power regulation in order to support voltage stability of wind farms, and compensate reactive power consumption from the grid. Several devices are grouped under the name of FACTS, which embrace different technologies and operating principles. Here, three of them are evaluated and compared, namely STATCOM (Static Synchronous Compensator), SVC (Static Var Compensator) and SSSC (Static Synchronous Series Compensator). They have been modeled in MATLAB / Simulink, and simulated under various scenarios, regarding both normal operation and grid fault conditions. Their response is studied together with the case when no FACTS are implemented. Results show that SSSC improves the voltage stability of the wind farm, whereas STATCOM and SVC provide additional reactive power.

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A pressure vessel that features an internal lattice structure, which allows the vessel to be constructed to any size or shape.