Cost Effective Frequency control of Micro Hydro Power Plant
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Date
2018-03
Authors
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
AAU
Abstract
Micro Hydro-Power Plants (MHPPs) are a reliable solution for supplying small power
consumers in areas located far from the distribution grid. However controlling frequency of the
generated power is one of the main problems in micro hydro power plants. This thesis presents a
control structure that ensures the frequency regulation of an induction generator (IG). Induction
generator is chosen over synchronous generator because it has an advantage with price,
robustness, simpler starting and controlling mechanism.
The main work of this thesis is to design a cost effective frequency controller for MHPP. For the
control of the frequency, a fuzzy logic controller is used. The controller is modeled, designed and
simulated to be simple, fast response fuzzy logic based frequency control system and lower cost.
For lower cost, the fuzzy logic controller is realized using Field Programmable gate array rather
than microcontrollers.
The frequency controller controls frequency of the micro hydro-power plant nearly constant.
When the flow of water is minimum, the controller is designed to prevent component from
damage by initiating a shutdown. It is observed from the simulation results that the overshoot of
the fuzzy controller for 75% load change and 0.2 m
3
/s flow rate is 2.74%, 3.04% and 3.46% and
the settling times are 20.87, 27.65 and 39.82 seconds. Moreover, the comparison of fuzzy logic
controller and PI controller is observed.
The fuzzy logic controller has been coded, compiled and simulated in VHDL using ModelSimAltera.
From
simulation
result,
the
system
inferred
maximum
operating
frequency
is
5
MHz
with
a
critical
path
of
199.3
ns.
Description
Keywords
Micro Hydro-power plant, Fuzzy Logic Controller, Induction Generator, VHDL