VOLTAGE CONTROL AND REACTIVE POWER SUPPORT SERVICE

System operators use reactive power resources to maintain the voltage at all the
buses around the nominal value. Keeping transmission level voltages at nominal
value or within a tight range ensures proper voltages at the distribution levels.
Another important factor is that the transmission network security is closely
associated with the voltage profile. Since the voltage on a bus is strongly coupled
with the supply of reactive power, the voltage control service is also called reactive
power support service.It is prudent to control the bus voltages by providing for
reactive power locally, rather than making it to flow through the grid. There are
three major reasons for this. First, the power system equipment is designed to
operate within a range of voltages, usually within 5% of the nominal voltage. At
low voltages, the performance of most of the electrical equipments is poor. For
example, induction motors can overheat and get damaged. High voltages not only
damage the equipment but lalso shorten their life.Second, the power transmission
capability available from a transmission line design is limited by technological as
well as economical constraints. The reactive power consumes transmission and
generation capacity. To maximize the amount of real power that can be transferred
across a congested transmission interface, reactive power flows must be
minimized. Similarly, reactive power production can limit a generators real power
capability.Third, moving reactive power on the transmission system incurs real
power losses. Thus, additional energy must be supplied to replace these
losses. Different Sources of Reactive Power Reactive power support can be
provided by active sources like generators and synchronous condensers, as well as
by locally installed passive elements like capacitors or inductors. Power electronics
based family of devices called Flexible AC Transmission System (FACTS) can
also act as reactive power support devices. Various sources of reactive power
support have different characteristics in terms of dynamics and speed of response,
ability of voltage changes, capital costs, operating costs and opportunity costs.
Their technical as well as economical considerations are discussed
next. Generators The synchronous generators are very fast reactive support
devices. The ability of a generator to provide reactive support depends on its real-
power production. Figure 6.6 shows the limits on real and reactive production for a
typical generator. This is also called as a capability curve of a generator. Like most
electric equipment, generators are limited by their current-carrying capability. Near
rated voltage, this capability becomes an MVA limit for the armature of the
generator rather than a MW limitation, shown as the armature heating limit in the
figure. Production of reactive power involves increasing the magnetic field to raise
the generators terminal voltage. Increasing the magnetic field requires increasing
the current in the rotating field winding. This too is current limited, resulting in the
field-heating limit shown in the figure. Absorption of reactive power is limited by
the magnetic-flux pattern in the stator, which results in excessive heating of the
stator-end iron, the core-end heating limit. The synchronizing torque is also
reduced when absorbing large amounts of reactive power, which can also limit
generator capability to reduce the chance of losing synchronism with the
system.Usually, a synchronous generator is mandated to absorb or produce reactive
power in a band bounded by limits R1and R2, shown by dotted lines in Figure 6.6.
However, outside this band, it is entitled for opportunity costs if real power output
is required to be reduced in order to produce more reactive power. For example, as
shown in the figure, if a generator is asked to supply reactive power equal to B2,
rather than B1, the operating point of generator changes from current point X to
new point Y, forcing reduction in real power output from D1 to D2. More on
calculation of loss of opportunity cost is provided in further

sections. Figure 6.6:

Generator Capability Curve Under the vertically integrated structure, only the
capital and operating costs that could be associated with the extra equipment (e.g.,
parts of the voltage regulator, exciter, stator, and rotor plus the operating costs
associated with field losses) required for voltage control were charged to the
voltage control function. However, in a deregulated environment, the opportunity
costs associated with reduced real power sales when excessive reactive power is
required becomes an important component of the total cost of providing voltage
control from generators. In [23], it is mentioned that the costs and prices for
voltage support will be highly nonlinear with system load. At very high levels of
system load, the opportunity cost of voltage support will far exceed the embedded
cost. Synchronous Condensers Synchronous machines that are designed
exclusively to provide reactive support are called synchronous condensers.
Synchronous condensers have all of the response speed and controllability
advantages of generators without the need to construct the rest of the power plant.
As compared to the static alternatives of reactive power support, due to presence of
moving parts and system auxiliaries, they require more maintenance. They also
consume real power equal to about 3% of the machines reactive-power
rating. Capacitors and Inductors Capacitors and inductors are passive devices that
generate or absorb reactive power. They accomplish this without significant real-
power losses or operating costs. The output of capacitors and inductors is
proportional to the square of the voltage. Capacitor banks are composed of
individual capacitors. The individual capacitors are connected in series and parallel
to obtain the desired capacitor-bank voltage and capacity rating. The capacitor
banks are often configured with several steps to provide a limited amount of
variable control. Inductors are designed to absorb a specific amount of reactive
power at a specific voltage. They can be switched on or off but offer no variable
control. Static VAR Compensators (SVCs) An SVC combines conventional
capacitors and inductors with fast switching capability so as to provide a
continuous range of control. The range can be designed to span from absorbing to
generating reactive power. Consequently, the controls can be designed to provide
very fast and effective reactive support and voltage control. Because SVCs use
capacitors, they suffer from the degradation in reactive capability as voltage
drops. Static Synchronous Compensators (STATCOMs) The STATCOM is a
solid-state shunt device that generates or absorbs reactive power and is one
member of a family of (FACTS) devices. The STATCOM shows similar
performance as that of SVC, when compared on the basis of response speed,
control capabilities, and the use of power electronics. However, the basic
difference is that the STATCOM uses power electronics to synthesize the reactive
power output, without employing capacitors and inductors. The STATCOM
ensures very fast and efficient voltage control by virtue of its solid state nature.
STATCOM capacity does not suffer as seriously as SVCs and capacitors do from
degraded voltage. STATCOMs are current limited - so their MVAR capability
responds linearly to voltage as opposed to the voltage-squared relationship of
SVCs and capacitors. This attribute greatly increases the usefulness of
STATCOMs in preventing voltage collapse. Comparison between Various Sources
of Reactive Power The comparison can be based on three parameters: voltage
support ability, costs and means of procurement. Voltage support ability A limiting
characteristic of capacitors and capacitor-based SVCs is that output drops
dramatically when voltage is low and support is needed most. STATCOMs provide
more support under low-voltage conditions than capacitors or SVCs because their
capability drops linearly with voltage. The output of rotating machinery (i.e.,
generators and synchronous condensers) generally rises with dropping voltage.
Generators and synchronous condensers generally have additional emergency
capacity that can be used for a limited time. Thus, Voltage-control characteristics
favor the use of generators and synchronous condensers. Costs Costs, on the other
hand, favor capacitors. Generators have extremely high capital costs because they
are designed to produce real power, rather than reactive power. Even the
incremental cost of reactive support from generators is high, although it is difficult
to unambiguously separate reactive power costs from real power costs. Operating
costs for generators are high as well because they can involve real-power losses.
Finally, because generators have other uses, they experience opportunity costs
when called on simultaneously to provide high levels of reactive and real power.
Synchronous condensers have the same characteristics as generators; but, because
they are built solely to provide reactive support, their capital costs are not as high
and they incur no opportunity costs. SVCs and STATCOMs are high cost devices
as well, although their operating costs are lower than those for synchronous
condensers and generators. Means of procurement System operators can acquire
reactive sources either through mandates or purchases. It might be possible to
create competitive markets for obtaining these services, provided the reactive
supplies are not geographically restricted. It is a general belief that the location
limitations on reactive resources are sufficiently demanding that competitive
markets can not develop for this service. However, some possible reactive power
market designs are proposed in [23].Some system operators pay generators their
embedded costs for reactive resources. However, determining the embedded costs
of generator to provide reactive power support leads to ambiguity. This is so
because; the same equipment is used to provide both real and reactive power.
Questions like what percentages, for example, of the exciter, generator stator,
generator rotor, turbine assembly, and step-up transformer should be assigned to
each function are not easy to answer. Table 6.1 shows the comparison of various
types of reactive power sources.
 Ability Costs
Reactive
Speed of to
Power
response support Operating Opportunity
Source
voltage
Synchronous
Fast Excellent High Yes
Generator
Synchronous
Fast Excellent High No
Condenser
Poor,
Slow,
capacitor Drops None No
Stepped
with V2
Poor,
SVC Fast Drops Moderate No
with V2
Fair,
STATCOM Fast Drops Moderate No
with V
Table 6.1: Comparison of various sources of reactive power support Issues in
Reactive Power Management The research pertaining to reactive power
management can be classified into two streams: market design for reactive power
and reactive power placement analysis. The possibility of establishing a market
mechanism for reactive power is an involved issue because of the basic difference
in needs and characteristics of reactive power when compared with real power. It
has been mentioned earlier that reactive power support should preferably a local
phenomenon. Thus, it is now easy to appreciate that the worth of 1 MVAR of
reactive power is different at different locations in the system. Some of these
concerns about reactive power make market modeling for it different from that of
real power. These aspects are discussed at length with some alternatives of reactive
power market designs in [5, 13, 16]. A great deal of research has been done on
optimal allocation and sizing of reactive power sources to improve the system
voltage profile and reduce losses [6-12]. Reference [21] proposed an integrated
framework for optimal reactive power planning and its spot pricing, in which the
selection of VAR source sites is based only on the real power generation operation
benefit-to-cost ratio for a capacitor on a load bus. The approach neglects the effect
of voltage improvement and system loss reduction in the selection of VAR source
sites. Three parallel methods can be used to determine the potential sites for new
VAR sources, namely: the cost-benefit analysis (CBA), the sensitivity method
(SM) and the voltage security margin method (VSMM) [21]. All three methods
(CBA, SM and VSMM) reflect the improvement of the system operation state after
the VAR support service is provided. The reader is referred to appropriate
references for details of the above aspects.