Optimisation of Offshore Wind Farm Cable Connection Layout Considering Levelised Production Cost Using Dynamic Minimum Spanning Tree Algorithm

The approach in this study has been developed to optimise the cable connection layout of large-scale offshore wind farms. The objective is to minimise the levelised production cost (LPC) of an offshore wind farm by optimising the cable connection configuration. On the basis of the minimum spanning tree (MST) algorithm, an improved algorithm, the dynamic MST algorithm is proposed. The current carrying capacity of the cable is considered to be the main constraint and the cable sectional area is changed dynamically. An irregular shaped wind farm is chosen as the studied case and the results are compared with the layout obtained by a traditional MST algorithm. Simulation results show that the proposed method is an effective way for offshore wind farm collection system layout design.