Adaptive Maximum Power Point Tracking Algorithm for

Variable Speed Wind Power Systems

Moo-Kyoung Hong and Hong-Hee Lee

School of Electrical Engineering,

University of Ulsan, Nam-Gu, 680-749 Ulsan, South of Korea
{nice1204,hhlee}@mail.ulsan.ac.kr

Abstract. This paper proposes an adaptive maximum wind power extraction

algorithm for variable speed wind power generation systems. The proposed
control algorithm is analyzed with the air density effects on the maximum
power point tracking (MPPT) method, which is based on the conventional hill
climb searching (HCS). To implement this algorithm, the memory features and
the initial tip speed ratio (TSR) are taken into account. The control scheme is
performed in three separate operation steps according to the power curve of a
generator to improve the tracking performance. The feasibility and
effectiveness of the proposed MPPT strategy have been verified through
simulations and experimental results.

Keywords: Hill Climb Searching (HCS), Maximum Power Point Tracking

(MPPT), Permanent Magnet Synchronous Generator (PMSG).

1 Introduction

Nowadays, wind energy has become one of the most important renewable energy
resources. In a wind power system, wind speed is varying in magnitude and direction at
any time. To extract the maximum power under given wind conditions, the performance
of maximum power point tracking (MPPT) algorithm is very important. There are three
types of well-known maximum wind power extraction methods, i.e., Tip Speed Ratio
(TSR), Power Signal Feedback (PSF), and Hill-Climb Searching (HCS)[1]. In these
methods, the HCS algorithm is more robust and easier to develop in a wind power
system than other methods. However, there are still some disadvantages associated with
the HCS algorithm, which can significantly deteriorate the performances, especially
under abrupt wind changing conditions. Accordingly, an optima solution is definitely
required to extract maximum power stably under varying wind speed and air density. [3]
In this paper, we propose a new strategy taking into account the air density effects
for the MPPT method based on HCS algorithm. Due to temperature changing and air
pressure, the air density is also varying. To adapt and compensate this effect, memory
features and initial TSR value are used in the MPPT control algorithm. The feasibility
and effectiveness of the proposed MPPT strategy have been verified through
simulations and experimental results.

K. Li et al. (Eds.): LSMS/ICSEE 2010, Part I, LNCS 6328, pp. 380388, 2010.
Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2010
 Adaptive MPPT Algorithm for Variable Speed Wind Power Systems 381

2 Wind Power Generation System

2.1 System Configuration

Fig 1 shows the block diagram of entire wind power generation system used for
control method. The wind power is emulated with DC motor, which is controlled
according to the real wind characteristic profile, and PMSG is operated as the wind
generator.

Fig. 1. Block diagram of entire wind power generation system

2.2 Wind Turbine Characteristics

The wind power is expressed:

1
Po = AV 3CP (1)
2
3
where Po : Energy extracted from rotor [W] : Air density [ kg / m ]
2
A : Rotary area of blade [ m ] V : Wind velocity [ m / s ]
CP: Power Coefficient.
Tip speed ratio is defined in (2), and the torque which is produced by the wind turbine
can be given like (3) from (1) and (2).
rotor Rblade
= (2)
Vwind
1
m = AV 2C (3)
2

where C is torque coefficient: .

CP
C = (4)

382 M.-K. Hong and H.-H. Lee

3 Maximum Power Point Tracking

3.1 Disadvantages of the Conventional HCS Algorithms

As shown in Fig 2(a), if the tracking step size becomes larger, the speed of maximum
power tracking can be faster. But, it deteriorates the efficiency of the MPPT control.
On the contrary, if we make the step size smaller, the efficiency can be improved.
However, the tracking speed becomes much slower.

Fig. 2. (a) Trade-off between step size and speed-efficiency (b) Misleading decision of
conventional HCS under changing wind conditions

When wind speed changes, the misleading decision of conventional HCS method
causes the failure in keeping maximum power and HCS algorithm moves downhill as
illustrated in Fig 2(b).

3.2 Air Density Effect

The wind power linearly varies with the air density sweeping on the blades. The air
density varies with pressure and temperature in accordance with the gas law:
p
= (5)
R T
where p : Air pressure, T : Temperature on the absolute scale, R : Gas constant.

Fig. 3. (a) Variation of temperature (b) Variation of Air Density from 2004 to 2009 in
Daegwallyeong area
 Adaptive MPPT Algorithm for Variable Speed Wind Power Systems 383

Fig.3 (a) shows the temperature variation of six years of data from 2004 to 2009 in
Daegwallyeong, Korea. As the temperature changes, the air density changes from
3 3
1.11 kg/m to 1.197 kg/m .

Fig. 4. Maximum power curves for different air densities

Fig. 4 shows the effect of air density on the power curve of the generator under
various wind speeds. When the air density is varying, the corresponding power curves
are also changed according to (1). More clearly, the maximum power curves are
shifted, which can be realized in three different colors in Fig. 4. Therefore, it is
necessary to consider this change to effectively improve the MPPT algorithm. The
following subsection explains the proposed control method to overcome the
mentioned problem in detail.

3.2 Proposed MPPT Algorithm

In this paper, three steps are analyzed according to the operation of a generator. The
tracking process to search maximum power point can be divided into three sections.
These sections are defined by the output variations: increases, maintenance, or
decreases as the generator rotating speed is increased. The flowchart of the proposed
algorithm is shown in Fig. 5. In the flow chart, there are three steps P is power
variation, V W is the wind speed, and initial is the initial TSR value.
The three steps are explained as follows:
Step 0: Run the conventional HCS algorithm to search
for approximate maximum power point using the initial
TSR. After that, new TSR value is calculated.
Step 1: The rotor speed reference is saved according to
wind speed. The optimal TSR is updated for next step
use.
Step 2: In this step, the rotor speed reference and
wind speed are extracted from step 1 for control
algorithm calculation. By adopting the memory feature,
the accurate rotor speed reference can be achieved for
extracting maximum power point. Likewise, the step 0
and step 1 are done again continuously.
384 M.-K. Hong and H.-H. Lee

Fig. 5. Maximum Power Point Tracking Algorithm Flow Chart

4. Simulation

4.1 Simulation Model

The wind energy conversion system was simulated using MATLAB SIMULINK. The
system consists of four parts: air density and wind condition, wind turbine model,

Table 1. Parameter of Cp Table 2. Wind Turbine Model Parameters

controller, generator, and power system. The wind turbine emulator (WTE) must
exactly produce torque speed curve for real wind turbine when the wind speed
changes. In order to generate the torque-speed curve as real wind turbine, C must
be described at least up to the 6th order polynomial:
 Adaptive MPPT Algorithm for Variable Speed Wind Power Systems 385

i =6
C ( ) = a0 + ai i (6)
i =1

Table 1 shows the coefficients ai .

Parameters of Cp and Wind Turbine Model parameters which are used in WTE are
shown in Table 1 and Table 2, respectively.

4.2 Simulation Results

Fig. 7 (a) and (b) show the simulation results with changing of wind speed from 6m/s
to 8m/s at t = 2.5s and from 8m/s to 10m/s at t = 12.5s. WTE gives torque reference
according to changing wind speed and air density. MPPT algorithm is activated, and
the controller starts to track the maximum power point (MPP) by adjusting the
DC/DC converter duty cycle.

Fig. 6. Simulation result of proposed MPPT algorithm (a) Wind turbine power and DC power
(b) Power coefficient

As shown in Fig. 7(a), the extracted DC power is close to the maximum wind
power, and the power coefficient reaches its maximum value in Fig. 7(b).
Simulation results show that the proposed MPPT algorithm has good dynamic as well
as the steady state performances throughout the MPPT process. The proposed MPPT
algorithm can exactly extract the maximum wind turbine power at any given wind
condition.

5 Experimental Results
The WTE was implemented by 2.2kW, 1750rpm DC motor with torque control as
shown in Fig. 8. The control algorithm for the WTE was implemented using a
floating-point DSP TMS320F28335 with a clock frequency of 150 MHz. The wind
speed profile is sent from PC to processor via RS-232, and the WTE can be controlled
and supervised by a monitoring program on PC.
In the prototype shown in Fig. 9, the DC motor is used to emulate as a wind turbine
and rotates a 3kW PMSG. The generator stator output voltage is connected to an
uncontrolled rectifier. A 10 resistor is used as load to consume the power which is
generated by PMSG. The parameters of DC motor and PMSG which were used in
experiments are same as simulation conditions.
386 M.-K. Hong and H.-H. Lee

Tref
Nref Iref
Tdt
dn=
2J

i
n v

Fig. 7. Wind turbine emulator

Fig. 8. System Configuration of WTE and PMSG controller

Fig. 10 and 11 show the experimental results of conventional HCS MPPT

algorithm and proposed MPPT algorithm, respectively. In Fig 10 (a) and 11 (a), the
blue line, the red line line represent for the maximum wind power and the DC power,
respectively.

Fig. 9. Experimental results of conventional HCS algorithm (a) Wind Turbine Power and DC
power (b) Power coefficient

In Fig. 10, the extracted power of conventional HCS algorithm is lower than the
derived power obtained in the proposed MPPT algorithm, and the power coefficient is
unstable than its maximum value. The proposed algorithm illustrates the fast response
of tracking maximum power as compared to the conventional HCS algorithm. As a
result, the proposed algorithm gives the effectiveness of power tracking in the
dynamic conditions as the wind speed and air density changes. As seen in Fig. 11, the
extracted DC power is close to the maximum wind power, and the power coefficient
 Adaptive MPPT Algorithm for Variable Speed Wind Power Systems 387

Fig. 10. Experiment result of proposed MPPT algorithm (a) Wind Turbine Power and DC
power (b) Power coefficient

is stable at its maximum value, 0.475. When wind speed changes from 6m/s to 8m/s
and from 8m/s to 10m/s, the DC power is quickly adjusted to reach the new maximum
wind power.

6 Conclusions

This paper proposed a MPPT algorithm based on utilizing the memory features and
the initial TSR value. The proposed algorithm effectively overcomes the drawbacks
existed in the conventional HCS algorithm such as misleading tracking power curve
and trade-off between step size and speed-efficiency. Based on the operation
characteristic of generator, the proposed algorithm adapts three steps and accurately
performs self tuning to update reference speed data as the wind speed changes.
Furthermore, this algorithm does not require the knowledge of intangible turbine
mechanical characteristic such as its power coefficient curve, power or torque
characteristic, or torque characteristics. The feasibility and effectiveness of the
proposed MPPT strategy are entirely verified by the simulations and experimental
results. It can be seen from the results that the proposed MPPT algorithm is an
adaptive algorithm to be a superior strategy to be used in wind power system.

Acknowledgment. The authors would like to thank Ministry of Knowledge Economy

which partly supported this research through the Network-based Automation
Research Center (NARC) at University of Ulsan.

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