Simplified Floating Wind Turbine for Real-Time Simulation of Large-Scale Floating Offshore Wind Farms

Floating offshore wind has received more attention due to its advantage of access to incredible wind resources over deep waters. Modeling of floating offshore wind farms is essential to evaluate their impacts on the electric power system, in which the floating offshore wind turbine should be adequately modeled for real-time simulation studies. This study proposes a simplified floating offshore wind turbine model, which is applicable for the real-time simulation of large-scale floating offshore wind farms. Two types of floating wind turbines are evaluated in this paper: the semi-submersible and spar-buoy floating wind turbines. The effectiveness of the simplified turbine models is shown by a comparison study with the detailed FAST (Fatigue, Aerodynamics, Structures, and Turbulence) floating turbine model. A large-scale floating offshore wind farm including eighty units of simplified turbines is tested in parallel simulation and real-time software (OPAL-RT). The wake effects among turbines and the effect of wind speeds on ocean waves are also taken into account in the modeling of offshore wind farms. Validation results show sufficient accuracy of the simplified models compared to detailed FAST models. The real-time results of offshore wind farms show the feasibility of the proposed turbine models for the real-time model of large-scale offshore wind farms.