Effects of power electronic compensation on distribution network thermal and voltage violations

This paper is concerned with the use of medium-voltage power electronics in providing active compensation to distribution networks. The primary purpose of using active compensation is to allow for network growth in the form of distributed generation or customer demand increases. With continuing growth, network thermal and voltage constraints would eventually be violated at some point, even with the use of power electronic compensation. Through the study of increasing generation on several hundred distribution network datasets, trends in the type and location of these constraint breaches are identified for both uncompensated and compensated networks. In comparing the initial types of constraint breaches in uncompensated and compensated networks, the use of power electronics is seen to eliminate overvoltage issues as the primary concern in many cases. In addition, while power electronic compensation is seen to make a significant change in the growth accommodated before constraint breach, the location of these initial breaches is not altered appreciably.