IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ENERGY CONVERSION, VOL. 23, NO.

4, DECEMBER 2008

1073

Enhanced Control and Operation of DFIG-Based

Wind Farms During Network Unbalance
Lie Xu, Senior Member, IEEE

AbstractThis paper investigates the control and operation of

doubly fed induction generator (DFIG)-based wind generation systems under unbalanced voltage conditions. DFIG system behaviors
under unbalanced voltage are analyzed and different control targets are discussed. A new rotor current control strategy containing
a main controller and an auxiliary controller is proposed. The main
controller is implemented in the positive (dq)+ frame without
involving positive/negative sequence decomposition, whereas the
auxiliary controller is implemented in the negative (dq) frame
with negative sequence current extracted. The impact of providing unbalanced control on converter voltage rating is investigated.
Simulation results using EMTDC/PSCAD are presented for a
2-MW DFIG wind generation system to validate the proposed control scheme and to demonstrate the enhanced system operation
during small steady state and large transient unbalances.
Index TermsControl design, converter, doubly fed induction
generator (DFIG), modeling, unbalance, wind turbine.

V s, V r
Is, Ir
s , r
s , r
Ps , Qs
Lm
Ls , Lr
Ls , Lr
R s , Rr
s , r
Superscripts
+,

Subscripts
,
r , r
d, q
s, r
+,

NOMENCLATURE
Stator, rotor voltage vector.
Stator, rotor current vector.
Stator, rotor flux linkage vector.
Stator, rotor angular frequency.
Stator output, active and reactive power.
Mutual inductance.
Stator, rotor leakage inductance.
Stator, rotor self-inductance.
Stator, rotor resistance.
Stator flux, rotor angle.
Positive, negative (dq) reference frame.
Reference value for controller.
Conjugate complex.
Stationary axis.
Rotor r r axis.
Synchronous dq axis.
Stator, rotor.
Positive, negative components.

Manuscript received April 27, 2007. Current version published November

21, 2008. This work was supported in part by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC), U.K. under Grant EP/D029775/1.
Paper no. TEC-0007-2007.
The author is with the Department of Electronic and Electrical Engineering,
University of Strathclyde, Glasgow G1 1XW, U.K. (e-mail: lie.xu@eee.strath.
ac.uk).
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TEC.2008.2001452

Fig. 1.

Schematic diagram of a DFIG-based wind generation system.

I. INTRODUCTION
IND TURBINES based on doubly fed induction generators (DFIG), as schematically shown in Fig. 1, have
been widely used for large-scale wind generation systems. The
steady-state response and performance of DFIG-based wind turbines are now well understood [1][3]. For most of the studies
reported, symmetrical stator voltage supply was assumed during normal conditions and network disturbances. However, both
transmission and distribution networks can have small steady
state and large transient voltage unbalances. If DFIG control systems do not take into account the voltage unbalance,
the stator currents can become highly unbalanced even with the
small voltage unbalance. The unbalanced currents create unequal heating on the stator windings, and oscillations of torque
and output power. It has been found that wind farms connected
to distribution networks periodically experience higher voltage
unbalance of greater than 2%, and this has caused a large number
of trips [4].
System control and operation of DFIG under the unbalanced
network conditions have been studied in [5][9]. However, in [5]
and [6], the study was limited on controlling the grid-side converter to provide similar functions as a STATCOM [10]. Control of DFIG for the compensating torque pulsation under unbalanced supply voltage was investigated in [7] and [8]. The
required rotor compensating voltage was generated either from
the calculated compensating currents [7] or directly from the
torque pulsation [8], both oscillating at twice the network frequency. Thus, the controllers must be carefully tuned to provide
the required system response at double the supply frequency.
Xu and Wang [9] provided a detailed investigation into the impact of unbalanced stator voltage on the pulsations of stator
and rotor currents, torque, and stator active and reactive powers. A dual current controller based on separate loops for the
positive and negative sequence components was used to control
the rotor positive and negative sequence currents. Due to the
time delays introduced by decomposing the sequence components, such design can affect the overall system stability and

0885-8969/$25.00 2008 IEEE

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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ENERGY CONVERSION, VOL. 23, NO. 4, DECEMBER 2008

Fig. 2. Equivalent circuit of a DFIG in an arbitrary reference frame rotating

at a speed of .
Fig. 3. Relationships between the (), ( r r ), and the (dq)+ and (dq)
reference frames.

dynamic response. Furthermore, significant modifications have

to be made to the conventional vector control scheme widely
used in practical systems, and thus, makes it less likely to be
adopted in the real systems.
This paper investigates enhanced control and operation of the
DFIG system under unbalanced supply. A new rotor current control strategy is proposed that comprises a main and an auxiliary
controller. The main controller is constructed in the same way
as the conventional design without involving sequence components separation in order to guarantee system stability and high
dynamic response, while the auxiliary controller is specially
designed to control the negative sequence current taking into
account the impact of the main controller on negative sequence
components. The paper is organized as follows. Section II describes the DFIG system behavior under the unbalanced supply.
The principles of the proposed current controller are discussed
in Section III, whereas the impact of stator voltage unbalance
on the required converter voltage rating is investigated in
Section IV. Simulation results on a 2-MW DFIG system are
provided in Section V to demonstrate the feasibility of the
proposed control strategy, and finally, Section VI draws the
conclusions.
II. DFIG SYSTEM BEHAVIOR UNDER UNBALANCED VOLTAGE
A detailed study on the DFIG system behavior under unbalanced network supply has been provided in [9]. Thus, only a
brief description is given here.

A. DFIG Model
Fig. 2 shows the generalized equivalent circuit of a DFIG
represented in an arbitrary reference frame rotating at an angular
speed of . Under the unbalanced stator voltage supply, the
stator and rotor voltages, currents, and flux may contain both
positive and negative sequence components. According to Fig. 2,
the stator and rotor voltages and the flux, respectively, are given
by

Is =

( s Lm I r )
Ls

V r = Rr I r + r + j( r ) r

(1)

s = Ls I s + Lm I r

(2)

(3)

where = 1 L2m/(Lr Ls ) is the leakage factor.

Substituting (3) into (1) yields the rotor voltage in the arbitrary
rotating reference frame as



Lm

V r = Rr I r + Lr I r +
s
Ls



 
Lm
+ j ( r ) Lr I r +
s .
(4)
Ls
Under unbalanced conditions, a convenient way to model a
DFIG is to use a positive reference frame rotating at the speed
of s and a negative reference frame rotating at the speed of
s [9]. The spatial relationships of various reference frames
are shown in Fig. 3. As shown, the d+ -axis is fixed to the positive
stator flux s+ rotating at the speed of s , whereas the d -axis
rotates at an angular speed of s with the phase angle to the
-axis being s .
According to Fig. 3, the transformation of vector F between
the (), (r r ), (dq)+ , and (dq) reference frames is given
by
j s t
F+
,
(dq ) = F ( ) e

js t
F
(dq ) = F ( ) e

j 2 s t
F+
,
(dq ) = F (dq ) e

+
j 2 s t
F
(5b)
(dq ) = F (dq ) e

F ( r r ) = F ( ) ej r ,

F ( ) = F ( r r ) ej r

(5a)

(5c)

where superscripts + and refer to the positive (dq)+ and

negative (dq) frames, respectively.
Although unbalanced, the positive and negative stator voltages can still be regarded as being constant. Thus, there are
d +
= 0,
dt s+

V s = Rs I s + s + j s

r = Lr I r + Lm I s .

According to (2), the rotor flux and stator current can be

expressed using the stator flux and rotor current as



Lm
r =
s + Lr I r
Ls

d
= 0.
dt s

(6)

Taking into account (6) and separating the system expressed

in (4) into positive sequence components in the (dq)+ reference
frame and negative sequence components in the (dq) reference

XU: ENHANCED CONTROL AND OPERATION OF DFIG-BASED WIND FARMS DURING NETWORK UNBALANCE

frame yields a two-part DFIG model as

Lm slip+ +
1
+
s+ +
V+
I r + = A+ I +
r+ j
Lr Ls
Lr r +

(7a)

Lm slip
1

s +
V
I r = A I
r j
Lr Ls
Lr r

(7b)

where slip+ = s r , slip = s r . A+ = (Rr /

Lr ) jslip+ and A = (Rr /Lr ) jslip .
B. Active and Reactive Power Flow
+

In the (dq) frame, the stator and rotor currents, voltages, and
flux vectors F can be expressed using their respective positive
and negative sequence components as
+
+

j 2 s t
F+ = F+
.
+ + F = F+ + F e

I+
s

 Lm  +

1  +
j 2 s t
j 2 s t
s+ +

I r + +I
.
=
s e
r e
Ls
Ls
(10)

Under the unbalanced conditions, the active power and the

capacitive reactive power generated by the DFIG stator are calculated as
3
+
Ps + jQs = V +
s Is .
2

(11)

Substituting (9) and (10) into (11) and separating the active
and reactive powers into different oscillating components yield
[9]
Ps = Ps0 + Ps sin 2 sin (2s t) + Ps cos 2 cos (2s t)
Qs = Qs0 + Qs sin 2 sin (2s t) + Qs cos 2 cos (2s t) (12a)
where

+
sq
Ps0
+

3L

m
s

Qs sin 2 =
sq
2Ls

Qs cos 2
sd

+
Ir d +
Ir+q
+

I
r d
Irq

+
sd
+

sd

sq

sq

+
sq +
+
sd
+

sd

+
sd
+
+
sq
+

sq
sd
sq
sd
Qs0
+

3
s
+

+
Ps sin 2 =
sq

sd
sq
sd +

+
2Ls
+

+
Ps cos 2
sq
sd
sq
sd

+
+
+
sd +
Ir d +
+
sq
Ir+q
+

Lm I .
sd
r d

sq
Irq

According to Fig. 2, the electromagnetic power is given as

the sum of the active power absorbed by the equivalent voltage
sources js s and j(s r ) r [9]
3
+
+
+
Pe = Re[js +
s I s + j(s r ) r I r ]
2
3 Lm
+
r Re[j +
=
s Ir ]
2 Ls
= Pe0 + Pe sin 2 sin (2s t) + Pe cos 2 cos (2s t)
where

+
sq
Pe0
+
3L

m
Pe sin 2 =
r sd

2Ls

Pe cos 2
sq

(8)

Taking into account the constant stator positive and negative

sequence voltages and neglecting the stator resistance, the stator
voltage and current given in (1) and (3) can be expressed in the
positive (dq)+ reference frame by considering (8) as [9]
 +

+

j 2 s t
+
V+
(9)
s = js s + s = js s+ s e

(12b)

(12c)

1075

Ir+d +
Ir+q
+
I
r d
Irq

+
sd
+

sq

sd

sq

+
sd
+
+
sq
+

(13)

sd

+
sq
+
+
sd +

(14)

The electromagnetic torque of the DFIG is calculated as

Te =

Pe
(r /n)

(15)

where n is the number of pole pairs.

The active power input to the rotor windings can also be
calculated based on the stator active and electromagnetic powers
as
Pr = Ps Pe = (Ps0 Pe0 ) + (Ps sin 2 Pe sin 2 ) sin (2s t)
+ (Ps sin 2 Pe sin 2 ) cos (2s t) .

(16)

III. SYSTEM CONTROL

A. Alternative Control Targets
Under the unbalanced network conditions, both the positive
and negative currents need to be controlled. Apart from controlling the average stator active and reactive powers, i.e., Ps0
and Qs0 , shown in (12), two more parameters can be controlled.
For instance, the system can be designed to operate according
to one of the following control targets:
Target 1. Balanced stator current.
Target 2. Constant stator active power, i.e., Ps sin 2 = 0 and
Ps cos 2 = 0.
Target 3. Constant electromagnetic torque, i.e., Pe sin 2 = 0 and
Pe cos 2 = 0.
Target 4. No rotor current oscillation, i.e., no rotor negative
sequence current.
+
=
As the d+ -axis is fixed to the positive stator flux, i.e., sq
+
0, the reference values for the negative sequence dq currents
for the four different targets can be simplified and they are
synthesized in Table I [9].
Apart from the four targets listed earlier, other targets are also
possible such as contributing to the rebalancing of the network
voltage, or simultaneous attenuations of both power and torque
oscillations. For instance, the rotor negative currents are given as
the average of these for Targets 23 to reduce the oscillations of

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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ENERGY CONVERSION, VOL. 23, NO. 4, DECEMBER 2008

+
where V +
r 1 and V r 2 refer to the rotor control voltages produced
by the main and auxiliary controllers, respectively.
Using conventional decoupling control and without involving
any positive and negative sequence decomposition, V +
r 1 of the
main controller is designed as

TABLE I
ROTOR NEGATIVE SEQUENCE CURRENT REFERENCES [9]

+
+
V+
r 1 = Lr U r 1 Lr A+ I r + j

where
 +

+
+
U+
r 1 = I r = kp1 I r + I r + ki1

both active power and torque. According to Table I, the required

negative sequence currents are then given as
Ird =

sd

Lm

Irq =

sq

Lm

(17)

Equation (17) is identical to that for Target 1, shown in Table I.

This indicates that Target 1 not only removes any stator current
unbalance but also gives good attenuations of both power and
torque oscillations.

Lm slip+ +
1
Lm +
+
+
s +
(V +

I +
r = A+ I r j
r 1 +V r 2 )+
Lr Ls
Lr
Lr Ls s
(18)

(19)


+
I +
r + I r dt (20)

and kp1 and ki1 are the proportional and integral gains of the
main controller.
Substituting (8) and (19) into (18) and splitting into positive
sequence and negative sequence subsystems yield

 +


 +
+
I
+
k
(21a)
=
k

I
Ir+ I+
I +
p1
i1
r+
r+
r+
r + dt

d 
I r ej 2 s t
dt





j 2 s t

k
= kp1 I

e
I r ej 2 s t dt
i1
r

B. Proposed Control Design

The main requirement for the control system is to regulate
the Ir+d + , Ir+q + , Ird , and Irq to follow their respective varying
reference points. Typical control design would use two current
controllers based on (7a) and (7b), i.e., a positive sequence
controller in the (dq)+ frame and a negative sequence controller
in the (dq) frame [9]. Both positive and negative sequence
components have to be decomposed from the voltages, flux,
and currents. As the process of extracting positive and negative
sequence components involves considerable time delay and adds
amplitude and phase errors to the signals, the system cannot be
decoupled under the transient conditions. Therefore, the system
performance and stability are degraded. Furthermore, even when
the network is perfectly balanced, the control system still has
to decompose the current and flux and perform positive and
negative sequence currents control. This unnecessarily affects
the dynamic performance of the overall system.
In order to overcome the problems highlighted, a new DFIG
control strategy is adopted in this paper. The control system
contains a main controller and an auxiliary controller. The main
controller is implemented in the (dq)+ frame without involving
positive and negative sequence separation, i.e., it is designed
in the same way as the conventional method without considering network unbalance. The auxiliary controller is specially
designed for controlling the negative sequence current and is
implemented in the (dq) frame with negative sequence components extracted.
Based on (4), under the unbalanced conditions, a DFIG system can be represented in the (dq)+ frame as

Lm slip+ +
s
Ls


1  j 2 s t 
2s Lm 
V r2 e
+j
s ej 2 s t .
Lr
Lr Ls
(21b)

Equation (21a) represents the dynamics of the positive sequence currents and appropriate selection of kp1 and ki1 can
provide the required control. Alternatively, (21b) gives the dynamics of the negative sequence currents with the auxiliary
controller. Without causing significant impact on the system dynamics (21b) can be simplified by neglecting the integral term
as
1
2s Lm

V +j

I
r = A2 I r +
Lr r 2
Lr Ls s

(22)

where A2 = kp1 + j2s .

Based on (22), the control system for the auxiliary controller
can then be designed using decoupling control in the similar
way as for the main controller. Thus, in the (dq) reference
frame, extracting the negative sequence components and Vr2 is
then given by

V
r 2 = Lr U r 2 Lr A2 I r j

where
U
r2




= I r = kp2 I
r I r + ki2

2s Lm
s
Ls


(23)

I
r I r dt

(24)
and kp2 and ki2 are the proportional and integral gains of the
auxiliary controller.
The overall rotor control voltage is the combination of the
outputs from the main and the auxiliary controllers. According
to Fig. (3) and (5), in the rotor frame, it is given as
j ( s r )
j ( s r )
+V
.
V r ( r r ) = V +
r2 e
r1 e

(25)

XU: ENHANCED CONTROL AND OPERATION OF DFIG-BASED WIND FARMS DURING NETWORK UNBALANCE

1077

voltage limit (RVL) block is used to scale the output from the
auxiliary controller if the voltage limit is exceeded. Under such
a condition, the RVL scales the voltage output from the auxiliary
controller according to the converter voltage capability and the
main controller output, such that the voltage requirement from
the main controller is always met. Space vector modulation
(SVM) [11] is then used to produce the switching patterns for
the rotor-side converter to control the DFIG.

IV. CONVERTER VOLTAGE REQUIREMENT

Under the unbalanced voltage conditions, the rotor-side converter needs to generate adequate positive and negative sequence
voltages to control the positive and negative sequence currents.
Consequently, the maximum rotor voltage required will increase
compared with the system under the balanced supply.
Under the steady state conditions, the dq currents can be
regarded as being constant. Thus, according to (7), the required
rotor voltages are given as



Lm
+
+
(26)
slip+ +
V r + = Lr A+ I r + + j
s+
Ls



Lm

=
L
A
I
+
j
(27)
V
slip
r r
s .
r
Ls
For the positive components, since the d+ -axis is fixed to
+
s+ , neglecting the rotor-resistive voltage drop and considering
the relationship between the stator flux and voltage, (26) can be
simplified as
Fig. 4. Schematic diagram of the proposed control system. (a) Overall system
control structure. (b) Proposed current controller.

C. System Implementation
Fig. 4(a) shows the schematic diagram of the overall control
system while Fig. 4(b) illustrates the proposed current controller.
As shown in Fig. 4(a), a voltage unbalance detector (VUD)
detects the network unbalance and determines whether to switch
on the auxiliary controller. The VUD constantly monitors the
amplitudes of the negative and positive sequence components of
the source voltage. If the ratio between the negative and positive
sequence voltage components exceeds a predefined threshold,
say 1%, the VUD switches on the auxiliary controller. Thus,
under the normal conditions with very small voltage unbalance,
the auxiliary controller is disabled and the system is controlled
in the same way as with conventional design. When voltage
unbalanced is detected, the auxiliary controller is immediately
switched ON and the positive and negative sequence current
references are generated according to the active power/torque,
reactive power, and the preselected control target.
As shown in Fig. 4(b), the generated current references are
passed to the main and the auxiliary controllers to generate the
required rotor control voltage. Due to the limited voltage rating
of the rotor-side converter, the overall voltage requirement from
the main and auxiliary controllers may exceed the converters
capability. In order not to interfere with the normal operation
of the DFIG system, as shown in Fig. 4(a) and (b), a rotor

Vr+d + slip+ Lr Ir+q +

Vr+q + slip+ Lr Ir+d + +

Lm slip+ +
Vs+ .
Ls s

(28)

Due to the small value of , there is |Vr+q + |  |Vr+d + |. Thus,

the amplitude of the required rotor positive voltage can be approximated as

 

Lm slip+ + 
 +  
+
+
Vs+  . (29)
Vr + Vr q +  = slip+ Lr Ir d + +
Ls s
Similarly, according to (27), the amplitude of the negative
sequence rotor voltages is given by

2 
2

Vr =
(30a)
Vrd + Vrq
Vrd slip Lr Irq +
Vrq slip Lr Ird +

Lm slip
V
Ls s sd

Lm slip
V .
Ls s sq

(30b)

Equations (29) and (30) show that the required rotor voltage
is mainly dependent on the stator voltage and the rotor operating
slip. However, different load conditions and control targets that
result in different positive and negative sequence currents can
also affect the required rotor voltage rating. As |slip /s | > 1
and |slip+ /s | < 1, compensating the stator negative sequence
voltage requires a higher rotor voltage.

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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ENERGY CONVERSION, VOL. 23, NO. 4, DECEMBER 2008

TABLE II
PARAMETERS OF THE DFIG CONSIDERED

Fig. 6.

Schematic diagram of the simulated system.

V. SIMULATION STUDIES

Fig. 5. Variations of rotor voltage requirement for different

rotor slip and
stator voltage unbalances: (It is assumed V sd = V sq = V s / 2).

According to (25), the positive rotor voltage appears at the

rotor terminals as the fundamental component with a frequency
of (r s ), while for the negative sequence rotor voltage,
it superimposes on to the fundamental component with a frequency of (r + s ). Thus, the maximum required rotor voltage
amplitude is given as
Vr (m ax) = Vr++ + Vr .

(31)

For a 2-MW DFIG system whose parameters are shown in

Table II, Fig. 5 illustrates the impact of the stator voltage unbalance on the rotor voltage requirements for different rotor
operating slips. It is assumed that the positive stator voltage
is 1 per unit (p.u.) and the stator active and reactive powers
are 1 and 0.3 p.u. (leading power factor of 0.95), respectively.
The negative sequence currents were calculated according to
the requirement of Target 2. Fig. 5 clearly shows that under the
unbalanced supply, the voltage rating of the rotor-side converter
needs to be increased in order to perform the negative sequence
current control. The higher the rotor slip and voltage unbalance,
the bigger the converter rating required. For other control targets that result in different rotor negative currents, the required
rotor voltages were found to be similar to those shown in Fig. 5.
This is due to the factor that the rotor current contributions indicated by the first terms on the right-hand side of (30b) are
much smaller than the stator voltage contributions indicated by
the second terms.
If SVM is used, the maximum modulation index is 1.15 before
overmodulation [11]. Thus, the maximum amplitude of the rotor
phase voltage that can be generated is 0.575 Vdc , where Vdc
is the converter dc voltage. As indicated in Section III, if the
required rotor control voltage exceeds this limit, the RVL would
limit the output voltage from the auxiliary control, and thus, the
converter will not be able to provide full control of the negative
sequence currents.

Simulations of the proposed control strategy with different

control targets for a 2-MW DFIG system, whose parameters
are given in Table II, were carried out using Power Systems
Computer-Aided Design (PSCAD)/EMTDC. Fig. 6 shows the
schematic diagram of the implemented system. The nominal
converter dc voltage Vdc is 1200 V and SVM is used for both
converters with the switching frequencies being 2 kHz. The
main objective of the grid-side converter is to control the dc link
voltage and it is controlled using the same method as for the dc
voltage controller in a VSC transmission system [12]. As shown
in Fig. 6, a single-phase resistive load is used to generate the
voltage unbalance.
At the first instance, the DFIGs rotor speed was fixed, as the
large inertia of wind turbines resulted in slow changes of rotor
speed. Fig. 7 compares the simulated results with the conventional and the proposed control method. The stator voltage had
a steady state unbalance of around 4% and the rotor speed was
1.1 p.u. with the synchronous speed defined as 1 unit. The average stator active and reactive powers were set at 2 MW and
0 MVar, respectively. During 00.2 s, the conventional control without considering network unbalance was used, i.e., the
auxiliary controller was disabled. The auxiliary controller was
switched ON at 0.2 s with Target 1 being selected. The control
target was then changed to Target 2 at 0.4 s, Target 3 at 0.6 s,
and Target 4 at 0.8 s, respectively. As shown in Fig. 7, with conventional control during 00.2 s, the stator currents were highly
unbalanced. Similarly, the stator active and reactive powers,
and the electromagnetic torque all contained significant 100 Hz
oscillations. The three-phase rotor currents had both the 5-Hz
fundamental component (positive slip, i.e., 55 Hz 50 Hz) and
the 105-Hz harmonic component (negative slip, i.e., 55 Hz +
50 Hz). Once the auxiliary controller was enabled, as can be seen
from Fig. 7(c)(e), both the positive and negative sequence currents were controlled precisely by the proposed control design
and the interactions between them were minimum. The tracking
of the negative sequence currents was satisfactory during the
switching of various control targets that resulted in the variations of their respective reference values. Fig. 7(i) also shows
that controlling the negative sequence current required a large
negative sequence voltage that appeared as the 21st harmonic.
For different control targets, the measured stator current unbalance, the rotor current ratio between the 105 Hz (21st)
harmonic and the 5 Hz fundamental component, the 100 Hz
pulsations of the stator active and reactive powers, the torque,

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1079

TABLE III
COMPARISONS OF DIFFERENCE CONTROL TARGETS WITH
CONVENTIONAL DESIGN

Fig. 7. Simulated results with different control targets. (a) Stator current (in
kiloampere). (b) Rotor current (in kiloampere). (c) Rotor positive dq axis
current (in kiloampere). (d) Rotor negative d-axis current (in kiloampere).
(e) Rotor negative q-axis current (in kiloampere). (f) Stator active and reactive powers (in megavolt ampere). (g) DFIG electromagnetic torque (in per
unit). (h) Converter dc voltage. (i) Rotor voltage modulation signal.

and the dc voltage are compared in Table III. As can be seen

from Fig. 7 and Table III, the defined objectives of the various
control targets have been fully achieved. Target 1 not only minimized the stator negative sequence current but also gave good
attenuations of both power and torque oscillations. Similar tests
for different rotor speeds have also been carried out and the
system performances were found to be similar to those shown
in Fig. 7. Due to the space limitation, they are not shown here.
Since the active power exchange between the DFIG and the
rotor-side converter contained 100 Hz oscillation, the common
dc voltage had also 100 Hz oscillation. The impact of such

Fig. 8. Simulation results with single-phase voltage dip applied between 0.1
and 0.3 s, voltage unbalance 9.5%. (A) Conventional control. (B) Proposed
control (Target 3).

an oscillation on system control was found to be negligible as

precise control of both the rotor currents and the currents for
the grid-side converter (not shown due to space limitation) had
been obtained. For practical systems, the selection of the control
target will be highly dependent on the design of the wind turbines
and the operation of the network. Nevertheless, by adopting one
of the control targets and the proposed current control scheme,
the overall system operation can be greatly enhanced during
network unbalance.
Tests on system control and operation during transient network unbalance were also carried out and the results are shown
in Figs. 8 and 9 for voltage unbalances of 9.5% and 17.5%,

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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON ENERGY CONVERSION, VOL. 23, NO. 4, DECEMBER 2008

TABLE IV
COMPARISON OF CONVENTIONAL AND PROPOSED METHOD (VOLTAGE
UNBALANCE 17.5%)

Fig. 9. Simulation results with single-phase voltage dip applied between 0.1
and 0.3 s, voltage unbalance 17.5%. (A) Conventional control. (B) Proposed
control (Target 3).

respectively. Again, the rotor speed was fixed at 1.1 p.u. The
voltage unbalances were induced by switching in a single-phase
load between 0.1 and 0.3 s. As shown, Fig. 8(A) and (B) compares the system responses between the conventional control
and the proposed method with Target 3. With the proposed control, when the unbalance occurred at 0.1 s, it was immediately
detected by the VUD. Consequently, the auxiliary controller was
automatically switched ON. Thus, the negative sequence currents
were quickly regulated according to the Target 3 requirements.
Comparing Fig. 8(A) and (B), it can be seen that with the proposed control system, the operation of the system during such a
transient network unbalance was much smoother with reduced
torque and current oscillations. After the removal of the voltage
unbalance, the negative sequence controller was automatically
switched OFF and the system was back to the normal control
mode.
As shown in Section IV, for larger voltage unbalance, the
required rotor voltage may exceed the capability of the rotorside converter. Consequently, it is not possible to fully control
the negative sequence currents. Fig. 9(A) and (B) compares the
system response with the conventional control and the proposed

Fig. 10. Simulated results with torque variation. (a) Rotor current (in kiloampere). (b) Stator active and reactive power (in megavolt ampere). (c) Rotor
voltage modulation signal. (d) Electromagnetic torque (in per unit). (e) Rotor
mechanical speed (in per unit).

control during a relatively large voltage unbalance of 17.5%.

As can be seen from Fig. 9(B), due to the limited converter
voltage rating, it was unable to control the negative sequence
currents precisely. Nevertheless, with the proposed control, the
oscillations of the torque, power, and stator and rotor currents
were significantly reduced compared to that under conventional
control and this can be further observed in Table IV. Tests with
larger voltage unbalance and other control targets have been
found to give similar trends as these shown in Figs. 8 and 9.
However, the larger the voltage unbalance is, the less significant
the proposed control becomes due to the converter voltage limit.
Similarly, a larger rotor slip also reduces the ability of the converter to provide negative sequence current control. During severe voltage unbalance, the rotor-side converter may experience
overcurrent/overvoltage and conventional protective measures
such as rotor crowbar can be used to meet the fault ride through
requirement [13].
System responses of the proposed control strategy during
variations of DFIG speed and torque were also studied and the
results are shown in Fig. 10. The input mechanical torque and

XU: ENHANCED CONTROL AND OPERATION OF DFIG-BASED WIND FARMS DURING NETWORK UNBALANCE

reactive power reference were step changed from 0.3 to 1 p.u.

at 0.2 s and from 0.5 MVar (lagging) to +0.5 MVar (leading) at 0.5 s, respectively. The stator voltage initially had 4%
unbalance but the unbalance was removed at 1.2 s. Target 3
was initially chosen but switched to Target 2 at 0.8 s. The reference of the DFIG active power output was calculated from
the optimal power-speed curve [1]. The lumped inertia constant of the system was set to a relatively small value of 0.5 s
in the study for a better illustration. From Fig. 10, it can be
seen that for the period of 00.8 s, although the stator voltage had 4% unbalance the stator reactive power and torque
had no 100 Hz pulsation. When the controller was switched
to Target 2 at 0.8 s, the stator active power oscillation quickly
diminished. After the voltage unbalance was removed at 1.2 s,
the auxiliary controller was automatically switched OFF thus
to remove any possible interactions between the main and
the auxiliary controllers. Fig. 10 clearly shows that the operation of the system during torque and speed variations is quite
satisfactory.

VI. CONCLUSION
This paper has presented methods for providing enhanced
system control and operation of DFIG-based wind turbines during network unbalance. A new rotor current control strategy
based on a main controller and an auxiliary controller has been
proposed. The main controller is designed in the same way
as for the conventional control without involving into positive
and negative sequence decomposition. On the other hand, for
the auxiliary controller, it is designed specifically for the negative sequence components. To perform the required negative
sequence current control under the unbalanced voltage, the required converter voltage rating is discussed in detail. It was
found that the converter rating needs to be increased with the
most critical condition being at high-voltage unbalance and high
rotor speed. Simulation results during both small steady state
and large transient unbalance conditions confirmed the effectiveness of the proposed control system. This is in contrast to
a conventional DFIG control system that results in excessive
oscillations of the stator active and reactive powers, electromagnetic torque, and stator/rotor currents under the unbalanced
supply voltage.

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Lie Xu (M03SM06) received the B.Sc. degree in
electrical and electronic engineering from Zhejiang
University, Hangzhou, China, in 1993, and the Ph.D.
degree in electrical and electronic engineering from
the University of Sheffield, Sheffield, U.K., in 1999.
He is currently with the Department of Electronic
and Electrical Engineering, University of Strathclyde,
Glasgow, U.K. From 2004 to 2007, he was with
Queens University of Belfast, Belfast, U.K., and also
with ALSTOM T&D, Stafford, U.K., from 2001 to
2003. His current research interests include power
electronics, wind energy generation and grid integration, and application of
power electronics to power systems.