Journal
SENSORS
Volume 18, Issue 2, Pages -Publisher
MDPI
DOI: 10.3390/s18020535
Keywords
wave energy; sensing applications; power management; energy harvesting; Wells turbines; Mutriku power plant
Funding
- University of the Basque Country (UPV/EHU) [PPG17/33]
- MINECO (MINECO/FEDER, EU) [DPI2015-70075-R]
- Basque Government through Elkartek
- Basque Energy Agency (EVE) [UPV/EHUEVE23/6/2011]
- Spanish National Fusion Laboratory (EURATOM-CIEMAT) [UPV/EHUCIEMAT08/190]
- EUSKAMPUS - Campus of International Excellence
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Oceans, and particularly waves, offer a huge potential for energy harnessing all over the world. Nevertheless, the performance of current energy converters does not yet allow us to use the wave energy efficiently. However, new control techniques can improve the efficiency of energy converters. In this sense, the plant sensors play a key role within the control scheme, as necessary tools for parameter measuring and monitoring that are then used as control input variables to the feedback loop. Therefore, the aim of this work is to manage the rotational speed control loop in order to optimize the output power. With the help of outward looking sensors, a Maximum Power Point Tracking (MPPT) technique is employed to maximize the system efficiency. Then, the control decisions are based on the pressure drop measured by pressure sensors located along the turbine. A complete wave-to-wire model is developed so as to validate the performance of the proposed control method. For this purpose, a novel sensor-based flow controller is implemented based on the different measured signals. Thus, the performance of the proposed controller has been analyzed and compared with a case of uncontrolled plant. The simulations demonstrate that the flow control-based MPPT strategy is able to increase the output power, and they confirm both the viability and goodness.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available