Adaptive fault accommodation of pitch actuator stuck type of fault in floating offshore wind turbines: A subspace predictive repetitive control approach

Individual Pitch Control (IPC) is a well-known and, in normal operating conditions, effective approach to alleviate blade loads in wind turbines. However, in the case of a Pitch Actuator Stuck (PAS) type of fault, conventional IPC is not beneficial since its action is disturbed by the failed pitch actuator. In this paper, a Subspace Predictive Repetitive Control (SPRC)-based IPC is proposed to implement a Fault Tolerant Control (FTC) strategy for Floating Offshore Wind Turbines (FOWTs) affected by PAS faults. In particular, an online subspace identification step is first carried out to obtain a linearized model of the FOWT system in faulty condition. The identified FOWT system is then used to develop a repetitive control law. Consequently, the adaptive repetitive control solution is implemented on the remaining healthy pitch actuators, in order to accommodate the PAS fault. Results show the developed SPRC approach allows to accommodate the PAS faults, achieving a considerable reduction of the blade loads in combination with lower pitch activities for the healthy actuators. This allows to continue power production and postpone maintenance operations, thus reducing the OM costs.