A Smart Switch Configuration and Reliability Assessment Method for Large-Scale Offshore Wind Farm Electrical Collector System

Abstract: With the development of offshore wind farms (OWFs) in far-offshore and deep-sea areas, each OWF could contain more and more wind turbines and cables, making it imperative to study high-reliability electrical collector system (ECS) for OWF. Enlightened by active distribution network, for OWF, we propose an ECS switch configuration that enables post-fault network recovery, along with a reliability assessment (RA) method based on optimization models. It can also determine the optimal normal state and network reconfiguration strategies to maximize ECS reliability. Case studies on several OWFs demonstrate that the proposed RA method is more computationally efficient and accurate than the traditional sequential Monte-Carlo simulation method. Moreover, the proposed switch configuration, in conjunction with the network reconfiguration strategy and proper topology, provides significant benefits to ECS reliability.