A wind turbine emulator using a three-phase induction motor controlled via DTC-SVM drive

The growing penetration of wind energy in global power systems necessitates advanced testing platforms for control development, component validation and grid-integration studies. Wind turbine emulators (WTEs) offer a viable solution, replicating turbine behavior under controllable laboratory conditions. This work presents the development and experimental validation of a WTE that uses a three-phase induction motor controlled by a hybrid Direct Torque Control with Space Vector Modulation (DTC-SVM) technique. The aerodynamic and mechanical dynamics of a real wind turbine are mathematically modeled, scaled, and integrated with the induction motor’s electromechanical model with inertia difference taken into consideration. To validate the proposed WTE, simulation studies and hardware implementation were carried out. A complete experimental test-bench was built in the laboratory using an 800 W motor, an IGBT inverter and a PC interfaced to a dSPACE DS1104 board. Simulation and experimental results confirm that the proposed WTE is capable of reproducing the torque-speed and power-speed curves across various operating conditions, including wind speed and load changes, with mean average error not exceeding 3%. The DTC-SVM control offers fast dynamic response with minimized torque ripples of about 10% only.