A brief introduction to lightning protection of wind power generation systems

Wind energy is a renewable and clean energy source, and wind power generation is the power resource with the most large-scale development conditions today. In order to obtain more wind energy, the single-unit capacity of wind turbines is increasing, and the height of the wind turbine is increasing with the increase of the hub height and the diameter of the impeller, and the risk of lightning strikes is also increasing. Therefore, lightning strikes have become the most harmful natural disasters in nature to the safe operation of wind turbines.

Lightning is a strong long-distance discharge phenomenon in the atmosphere, which can directly or indirectly cause disasters to many facilities on the ground. As a towering and protruding platform on the ground, wind turbines are exposed to the atmospheric environment for a long time, and most of them are located in the wilderness, which is very vulnerable to lightning strikes. In the event of a lightning strike, the huge energy released by the lightning discharge will cause serious damage to the blades, transmission, power generation and transformation equipment and control systems of the wind turbine, resulting in the shutdown of the unit, resulting in greater economic losses.

For the wind power generation system, it can be divided into several levels of protection zones from the outside to the inside according to the lightning protection. The outermost area is the LPZ0 area, which is the direct lightning strike area with the highest risk. The further inward, the lower the risk. The LPZ0 area is mainly formed by the barrier layer formed by the external lightning protection device, reinforced concrete and metal pipes. The overvoltage mainly enters along the line, and the equipment is protected by the surge protector.

TRS series surge protection device for wind power system adopts an overvoltage protection element with excellent nonlinear characteristics. Under normal circumstances, the surge protector is in a very high resistance state, and the leakage current is almost zero, thus ensuring the normal power supply of the wind power system. When a surge overvoltage occurs in the system, the TRS series special surge protector for wind power system will be turned on immediately within nanoseconds, limiting the amplitude of the overvoltage within the safe working range of the equipment, and at the same time transmitting the surge energy into The ground is released, and then, the surge protector quickly becomes a high-resistance state, which does not affect the normal operation of the wind power system.