22-05-2013, 11:42 AM
Transmission Systems for Offshore Windfarms
ABSTRACT
The electric system within an offshore wind farm and its connection to the main power
system pose new challenges to the experts. A large number of questions has to be answered
during this process: What is the best way of interconnecting the wind turbines of a wind
farm? How much redundancy is economically feasible? Will a conventional AC connection
do the job or is a High Voltage Direct Current (HVDC) technology based on Voltage
Source Converters (VSC) necessary for the connection to the onshore power system? What
is the risk of losing a cable leading to the mainland – or in other words: What redundancy is
needed for the grid connection to the mainland? How feasible is an offshore (DC?)
supergrid? What are the requirements for the onshore grid interconnection? And finally,
there remains the question regarding alternatives to the electricity transmission: Are there
other options for transmitting the energy produced by offshore wind farms to shore,
example by using hydrogen pipelines?