Real‐time gating signal generation and performance analysis for fully controlled five‐phase, ten‐pulse, line‐commutated rectifier

Abstract

Fossil fuel prices and air pollution impel many countries to concentrate on renewable energy sources, of which wind energy is considered to be a pillar. Owing to the numerous advantages when compared with its three-phase counterpart, five-phase direct-drive permanent magnet (PM) generators are a key area of focus in power generation with renewable and wind energy systems. The generator output requires a converter, such as an AC–DC rectifier, to match load requirements. The objective of this work is to generate in real time the gating signals of a fully controlled five-phase, line-commutated rectifier, fed from a five-phase PM generator. A mixed-reality environment is used to implement the gating signal generation algorithm for the five-phase rectifier, where the required gating signals are successfully generated, even with some distorted prototype generator voltage waveforms. The performance of the rectifier is investigated practically and validated by using the MATLAB/SIMULINK platform. Moreover, a comparison with a five-phase pulse-width modulated current source rectifier in terms of losses, size, weight, and cost is presented.