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Model predictive fault‐tolerant current control (MPFTCC) of permanent magnet synchronous generator (PMSG) drives can make a valuable contribution to improving the reliability and availability levels of wind turbines, because back‐to‐back (BTB) converters are prone to failure. However, MPFTCC suffers from excessive computational burden, because the BTB converter is treated as one system where all feasible voltage vectors (VVs) are used for prediction and evaluation. Accordingly, a computationally efficient MPFTCC algorithm for a PMSG drive is developed and proposed with the ability to handle insulated‐gate bipolar transistor open‐circuit faults. The candidate VVs of both machine‐ and grid‐side converters are separately predicted and evaluated, which significantly reduces calculation effort. The proposed reconfigurable converter is a five‐leg power converter with a common leg that connects the generator first phase to the grid three‐phase, ensuring proper postfault reconfiguration of the grid‐side inverter. Moreover, a three‐switch rectifier is adopted to achieve fault tolerance of the PMSG‐side rectifier. Performance of the considered MPFTCC strategies is evaluated by experimental means. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fault detection and fault accommodation, as well as fault tolerance, are important issues in closed-loop controlled three-phase converters. For such systems, power semiconductors and sensors are the most affected components by the occurrence of failures. Therefore, fault diagnosis and remedial operating strategies involving such components are highly required. In this paper, a new reliable approach is proposed, which aims to diagnose current sensor faults and power semiconductor open-circuit faults in permanent magnet synchronous motor drives. The proposed fault diagnosis scheme uses only the measured currents, which makes it suitable for real-time implementation. The performance of the proposed technique is analyzed through experiments. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Fault tolerance in wind turbines is considered crucial to increase their reliability and availability levels. This paper presents a fault-tolerant direct-drive permanent magnet synchronous generator (PMSG) using new direct control techniques, with the ability to handle power semiconductor open-circuit faults in the full-scale back-to-back converter. The fault-tolerant topology consists of a five-leg converter, with a shared leg connected to a generator phase and to its corresponding grid phase, through a triode for alternating current (TRIAC). The main contribution of this paper consists of the development of an alternative direct torque control and direct power control schemes for both machine-side converter and grid-side converter, respectively. Moreover, a reliable fault diagnostics algorithm without requiring additional sensors is also integrated, providing the information required to instantaneously trigger fault-tolerant remedial strategies. Simulation and experimental results are presented to validate the effectiveness of the proposed fault-tolerant PMSG drive. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]