Predictive individual-pitch control architecture for wind turbine fatigue load reduction

The aim to decrease the price of wind energy compels wind turbines manufacturers to design yet larger wind power plants. The large dimensions set also demanding requirements for the rotor and support structure of the plant limiting the practical size of the plants. Due to this limitation, an old concept of IPC have been recently widely restudied. IPC targets to eliminate periodic loads resulting from the unsteady aerodynamic force in the blade by cyclically adjusting the blade pitch angle. Conventionally, this has been accomplished only on selected frequencies, because most of the energy associated to the disturbances is at the rotation frequency of the rotor. The most used concept, however, requires time to converge and does not much alleviate faster disturbances due to turbulent airflow. This paper suggests a new concept in which each blade pitch angle is controlled using predictive disturbance data from the two other blades. The preliminary simulation shows promising results in both fatigue load reduction and pitch motor usage