Power systems transient stability enhancement using static VAr compensators

Electrical power demand continues to grow, but because of cost, and growing environmental concerns construction of new transmission lines is not keeping up with this trend. Therefore, power utilities are forced to load existing power lines to their thermal limits by improving on the transient stability limit. Several devices are used for this purpose; amongst them are static Var compensators (SVC), which are the topic of this paper. Specifically, this paper describes a method to (1) select the best location where to place SVCs, (2) identify the best supplementary signals to use for stability enhancement, and (3) tune the controller parameters to dampen inter-area oscillations. The algorithm is tested on a system developed by Ontario Hydro and used extensively in the literature to prove the effectiveness of proposed methodology. The software used in this study is based on an EPRI package (PSAPAC) and MATLAB