Abstract

Wind power is more and more developed as a renewable energy source. It is very essential to extract the maximum available power from the wind by operating the wind turbine at its optimal operating condition, called maximum power point tracking (MPPT). Perturb & Observe (P&O) is the simplest and mostly used algorithm for this purpose. However, this algorithm has its own disadvantages such as oscillation at maximum power point and wrong directionality under fast variation wind speed. Lots of publications are presented to solve these problems. In this paper, a conventional P&O algorithm, a modified MPPT algorithm and a fuzzy MPPT algorithm for variable speed wind turbine using permanent magnet synchronous generator (PMSG) are tested and compared in the terms of complexity, speed responses and the ability to acquire the maximal energy output.