An important aspect of wind power plant (WPP) impact studies is to evaluate the short-circuit current (SCC) contribution of the plant into the transmission network under different fault conditions. This task can be challenging to protection engineers due to the topology differences among different types of wind turbine generators (WTGs) and the conventional generating units.
While it is important to size the circuit breaker to accommodate the available SCC, the available rating of a circuit breaker is limited. A fault-current limiter (FCL) has the capability to limit the SCC, and in some cases, may be necessary to limit the SCC from a WPP to defer the replacement of a circuit breaker currently installed in the transmission line.
This paper investigates the capability of a saturable core FCL to limit the SCC of different types of WTGs. Different faults are simulated to investigate the effectiveness of the FCL to limit the SCC and to reduce transient torque during faults. Several cases will be considered to demonstrate the benefits of using FCLs in unique situations. (Read more...)
