Three generator designs serve many turbines
July 16, 2009 by Paul Dvorak
Filed under Electrical Systems, Wind Power Generators
ABB says it has developed permanent magnet (PM) generators for applications that call for direct drives, and medium and high-speed. The electrical performance of individual generators can be tweaked for best performance in cooperation with the wind-turbine OEM. For a closer look:
A low-speed gearless design works best in direct-drive applications. The turbine and generator form a compact and structurally integrated unit. The design is said to give free access to all parts for easy installation and maintenance. The simple and reliable low-speed rotor without separate excitation or cooling system results in minimum wear, reduced maintenance requirements, lower life-cycle costs, and a long lifetime.
A medium speed PM generator provides a compact low-speed system. The turbine main bearing and PM generator combined with a single-stage gear box to work at high efficiency and require little maintenance. This design features a simple and reliable low-speed generator rotor without separate excitation or cooling systems. The designs result in less wear, reduced maintenance requirements, lower life cycle costs, and a long lifetime.
And the third design arrangement is a high-speed PM generator similar to a doubly-fed version with even smaller space requirements. It is said to package high power in a small size. Its typical speed range is from 1,000 to 2,000 rpm using a 6 or 8-pole generator. Other pluses are a mechanically identical design to mainstream equipment but without slip rings.
ABB also offers wind turbine generators in conventional synchronous versions.
Windpower Engineering Editor Paul Dvorak is an experienced mechanical engineer. Paul has seven years of hands on mechanical engineering experience and 23 years of technical writing. Paul is constantly in correspondence with wind turbine manufacturers and wind power researchers. Thanks to this correspondence, he is able to write about wind engineering topics before any other editor in the wind space.
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