Fault Current Limiter and its Impact in PMSG based Grid connected Three Phase System

Modern day power systems have contributed to climatic change and reduced efficiency as a result of more utilization of conventional energy resources to match the increasing power demand. Hence grid systems that use distributed sources like wind and solar-based generating units are the recent areas of research. In last few decades, the size and power rating of wind turbines gradually increased with their performance efficiency. PMSG base wind conversion system has an advantage over classical DFIG based on compactness, heating, maintenance, and noise generation. It is very common to have abnormal conditions and faults due to high load demand, nowadays. As a result, a very high current is produced during fault and run through the power system which develops thermal and mechanical stress on power system equipment such as transformers, protecting devices etc. and causes heating. As the power system equipment is very expensive, their protection against this large current is very necessary. The fault in power system cannot eliminated but the harmful effect of fault can be lowered by limiting the current during fault period. To eliminate the issue of power system FCL is introduced which reduces fault current level within very little time before any protective device operates and increases power system stability. The proposed test model and results were designed using MATLAB/SIMULINK environment and the impact of model on fault current magnitude was verified.