Power fluctuation reduction in wind turbine generator systems

Although wind energy provides a viable solution to address ongoing challenges of the economy and the environment in electric power grids, the variable generation of this technology results in major technical challenges for system operators. This issue is becoming more severe as the penetration of wind generation is increasing. As a result, wind generation is commonly subject to specific regulations which limit generation fluctuations. Three methods of reducing wind generation fluctuation are investigated in this paper from an economic perspective, including (a) dumping the wind generation, (b) using battery energy storage (BES) to capture excess wind generation, and (c) a hybrid method combining this two approaches. The economic viability of the hybrid method is investigated via a developed linear programming model with the objective of profit maximization, which in extreme cases will converge to one of the other methods. Numerical simulations exhibit the merits of the proposed model.