Study of Superconducting Fault Current Limiters for System Integration of Wind Farms

As electrical energy will be provided from renewable sources, the connection of a large number of wind farms to existing distribution networks may lead to the increasing fault levels beyond the capacity of existing switchgear, especially in urban areas. Fault current limiters (FCLs) are essentially expected to control the prospective short circuit currents. In this paper, investigations were carried out to assess the effectiveness of the resistive superconducting fault current limiters (SFCLs) for fault level management in wind power system. System studies confirmed that the superconducting fault current limiter (SFCL) could not only control the fault currents but also suppress the inrush currents, when wind farm has adopted in the case of the system interconnection. As a result, the highly efficient operation of the wind power system becomes more possible by introducing the superconducting fault current limiters.