Data generated type-2 fuzzy logic model for control of wind turbines

Wind energy is becoming one of the most important and promising areas of renewable energy. During the past few years, wind energy generation underwent strong improvements in several fields including power electronics, mechanics, wind dynamics, etc. However, there is a high need to develop more intelligent control mechanisms that can handle the various sources of uncertainties encountered in wind turbines and allow maximum power to be obtained from wind. The recent years have witnessed the use of type-2 fuzzy logic systems to generate controllers which are able to provide robust control performances in the face of high levels of uncertainty. This paper presents a method to generate a type-2 fuzzy logic model entirely from data to provide a dynamic footprint of uncertainty for the generated fuzzy set. The fuzzy model will be used to predict the wind speed experienced by a wind turbine without the use of sensors. This estimated wind speed is then passed for another fuzzy controller that changes the pitch angles of the wind turbine blades in order to track the maximum power available. © 2010 IEEE.