Analysis and evaluation of two reference LiDAR-assisted control designs for wind turbines

Abstract

LiDAR-assisted wind turbine control holds promise in reducing structural loads and enhancing rotor speed regulation. However, a research gap exists in the practicality and limitations of commercially available fixed-beam LiDARs for large turbines and evaluating commonly employed LiDAR-assisted feedforward approaches. This study addresses these gaps by examining the implications of utilizing fixed-beam LiDARs in two wind turbine sizes and two reference LiDAR-assisted control strategies. A comprehensive evaluation considers coherence variations, uncertainties related to inaccurate pitch angle mapping with the upcoming wind speed, and their combined impact on load reduction. Numerical simulations reveal that an excessively low cut-off frequency in the low-pass filter can compromise preview time compensation. This is problematic in larger turbines, where coherence with limited LiDAR beams is inferior compared to smaller wind turbines, which deteriorates the effectiveness of the LiDAR-assisted control. Among the reference LiDAR-assisted control methods, the evaluation indicates the Schlipf approach has greater load reduction independence, while Bossanyi’s approach, which uses measurement of current blade pitch, yields positive results with fine-tuned baseline controllers. However, allowing baseline controller-induced frequencies to propagate into the controller may increase system excitation at certain frequencies due to the use of the actual pitch angle for feedforward pitch rate calculation.