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This paper aims to deal with the integration of energy storage devices (ultracapacitors) in wind energy applications to absorb the short terms fluctuations. The originality of this contribution is focused on energy management related to wind power frequency distribution between the hybrid sources. The robust and simplified control strategies are proposed and applied to DC‐DC converters without AC signals measurements. A novel MPPT method is introduced to operate the wind generator at the maximum power regardless of the wind speed variations. The fluctuating part of this power is mitigated by using a UC. The reference current of this last is obtained from a low pass filter. An innovative limitation algorithm of the UC voltage is proposed with aims to ensure optimal operation of the system. The control algorithms are implemented in a PIC18F4431 microcontroller. Some experimental results from this new approach are presented and analyzed.

This study is organized according to the following main and sub‐topics after introduction: frequency distribution principle; wind energy generation; short‐term fluctuations storage system; and experimental setup and results.

The simulations results highlight the interest of using ultracapacitors in a wind‐diesel system. The experimental results show that the short term fluctuations induced by the wind generator current are effectively mitigated by the ultracapacitors.

In this paper, an interesting MPPT method is presented. The fluctuations mitigation is realised by using the frequency distribution according to ultracapacitors dynamics. The ultracapacitors voltage control method is proposed with the aim of maintaining optimal operation conditions, and is validated by experimental tests.

The wind speed is very fluctuant and contains a significant energy. Taking into account the turbulent component in the energy management would increase the profitability of the wind‐diesel hybrid system. Sometimes, a diesel generator is used to compensate the requested energy but the storage devices are required to prevent disturbances induced by the wind generator current on the DC‐bus. The purpose of this paper is to show how the battery and flywheel (or ultracapacitors (UCs)) are used to mitigate the fluctuations of the wind generator current. The proposed method is based on the filtering of the wind generator current. The high power density sources (flywheel and UCs) are used in aims to improve the batteries' lifetime, which is estimated, in this paper, by using the rainflow cycles counting method. Spectral studies are made and the simulation and experimental results are analyzed.

This study is organized according to the following main and sub‐topics: wind speed characteristics, hybrid system energy management, behavioral simulations results, spectral analysis and batteries' lifetime estimation and experimental setup and results.

The simulations results highlight the interest in using a second‐order filter. The experimental results show that the fluctuations induced by the wind generator current are effectively mitigated by the storage devices.

The spectral analysis of the current for different filters parameters is realized and the application of the rainflow cycles counting method, in this context, is presented. This paper is interesting for the experimental hybrid system design according to the method proposed to control the DC‐DC converters.