Performance comparison of UPQC and Active Power Filters for a non-linear load

Reduction of the Harmonics is one of the major needs for an ideal power system and it is demanded that it should ideally provide a balanced and pure sinusoidal three-phase voltage of constant amplitude to the loads which should draw a current from the line at unity power factor and balanced phase. But, due to excessive use of power electronics in the industry, a complex problem of power quality has evolved characterized by the voltage and current harmonics, imbalances and low power factor. This paper deals with the performance comparison of the conventional Active Power Filters (APF) namely, the Series Active Filter for voltage and Shunt Active Filter for current against a combined topology named Unified Power Quality Conditioner (UPQC) using MATLAB/SIMULINK^® for the non-linear loads such as variable torque DC machine. In this paper IEEE-519 standards is taken for comparison with the obtained results from simulation. The results show that Unified Power Quality Conditioner (UPQC) is more effective tool against the harmonics in comparison to the Active Power Filters.