Design, implementation and control of pitching system for low-power wind turbine

Abstract

This paper presents design and development of novel pitch control mechanism for low power wind turbine (WT). Indigenously designed pitching system for WT and its fabrication is discussed in detail in this paper. Wind velocity does not remain constant throughout. In order to extract non fluctuating electric power from the WT, it is essential to have proper control system in place. Optimization of energy extraction from WT largely depend upon blades' shape and pitch angle. Here pitch angle mechanism and its control is focused. Existing low power WT have fixed pitch. The main reason being the cost and complexity. Here, design of relatively simple and low cost pitching mechanism is attempted. PID controller is developed for implementation of pitch control. It is validated in simulation. Microcontroller is used to support necessary control hardware.