Handling of unbalanced faults in HVDC-connected wind power plants

Abstract

High-voltage DC (HVDC) connections enable integration of wind power plants located very far from shore. The decoupled AC offshore grid comprises multiple WT converters, and the voltage magnitude and frequency is primarily controlled by the offshore high-voltage DC voltage-source converter (VSC-HVDC). Faults in the offshore grid challenge the connected converters to provide an adequate response improving the overall fault behavior. Of special interest are asymmetrical faults due to the resulting unbalanced voltage conditions. This article addresses such conditions in the offshore grid and analyzes the impact on the offshore grid behavior for different converter contributions. Four fault ride-through strategies are studied for the WT converters. The effect of over-modulation of the converter voltages during such voltage conditions is highlighted. A test system is defined to analyze the fault and post-fault behavior. It is found that voltage support from the WT converters in both positive and negative sequence shows the best performance compared to controlled negative sequence current suppression. This scheme helps additionally the VSC-HVDC AC voltage control to return quickly to normal operation. To validate this statement simulations are performed for line-to-line (LL) and single line-to-ground (SLG) faults in immediate vicinity of the VSC-HVDC.