Design Study of Multi-Rotor and Multi-Generator Wind Turbine with Lattice Tower—A Mechatronic Approach

Abstract

New locations for onshore technology, which have not been considered so far, must be developed to increase the total installed capacity of renewable energies, especially wind energy. For this purpose, cost-effective wind turbines, even in difficult-to-access locations, such as mountainous and high-mountainous areas, must be designed. This paper presents a novel wind turbine with a related control system that meets these requirements. The proposed turbine uses a multi-rotor configuration with five rotors arranged in a star shape configuration. Each rotor drive train combines up to 12 generators in a maintenance-friendly multi-generator concept. A suitable observer-based control for load mitigation in the full-load region is proposed for the multi-rotor and multi-generator design. Simulations are used to demonstrate the applicability and practical benefits of this concept.

Keywords

• mechatronic
• control of wind turbines
• multi-rotor wind turbines
• model-based controller design
• wind-speed observer