Lifetime improvement for wind power generation system based on optimal effectiveness of thermal management

Jun Zhang, Xiong Du and Cheng Qian

Applied Energy, 2021, vol. 286, issue C, No S0306261921000416

Abstract: The power module plays a vital role in the renewable energy conversion. But it is one of the most prone to fail components in the wind energy system. The thermal management has been proved to be a cost-effective mean to improve the reliability of wind energy system, but it has a dual nature. To balance the benefit and risk of thermal management, a lifetime extension strategy is proposed. This strategy considers the minimum junction temperature fixed to the lowest ambient temperature and the allowed maximum junction temperature determined by the predefined temperature swing. Then the related wind speeds of predefined temperature swing can be concentrated in a part wind speed area and the effectiveness of thermal management under each predefined temperature swing is calculated. The optimal effectiveness is chosen as a quantitative evaluation criterion to design the working range of thermal management and control target of junction temperature in a long time scale. As a benefit, the economic performance of thermal management is greatly improved in that each application of temperature control can reduce as much consumed lifetime of power module as possible. Case studies and experiments are presented for performance verification of proposed strategy. Results show that the consumed lifetime reduced by each application of temperature control is 6.04 × 10-3%. The expected lifetime of power module is extended from 7.55 years to 22.08 years which meets the target lifetime of wind power generation system (20 years). In addition, this method only needs to be applied in the specified working range where the wind speed is higher than 9.30 m/s. Thus, the disturbance on the system's normal operation is significantly alleviated.

Keywords: Lifetime improvement; Optimal effectiveness; Power module; Thermal management; Wind energy application (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306261921000416
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:appene:v:286:y:2021:i:c:s0306261921000416

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.elsevier.com/wps/find/journaldescription.cws_home/405891/bibliographic
http://www.elsevier. ... 405891/bibliographic

DOI: 10.1016/j.apenergy.2021.116476

Access Statistics for this article

Applied Energy is currently edited by J. Yan

More articles in Applied Energy from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().