Planning and operating ratings for inverter-based FACTS power flow controllers

The power industry may soon join the electronic age. It seems fair to predict that the EPRI tailored collaboration projects, including the recent demonstration of the Tennessee valley Authority Static Compensator (STATCOM), the imminent introduction of the Dynamic voltage Restorer (DVR) and the Distribution STATCOM (D-STATCOM), as well as the initiation of development for a Unified Power Flow Controller (UPFC) with AEP will usher the bulk power industry into a new era of inverter-based power electronic controllers. Just as pocket digital calculators made analog calculators (slide rules) obsolete, it seems likely that the day is not too far off when bulky switched capacitors and reactors will be supplemented by (and, in some cases, displaced by) sleek, modern, nearly infinitely adjustable and flexible electronic components. It seems likely that the use of these controllers will proliferate in a deregulated, competitive power market, since they offer a means of increasing transmission capacity without increasing the number of transmission lines. They also offer a means of forcing actual flows to correspond faithfully to contractual flows. The purpose of this paper is to outline some of the major performance considerations associated with specifying the planning and operating parameters of inverter-based FACTS devices, especially themore » Unified Power Flow Controller, and to outline some of the principal differences between the inverter-based controllers and those which are conventionally applied to power systems. While the capabilities afforded by these devices are quite unique and revolutionary, the means of analyzing and designing them are often available from a standard planning load flow.« less