Planning reactive power control for transmission enhancement

Sufficient controllable reactive power resources are essential for reliable operation of electric power systems. Inadequate reactive power support has led to voltage instability and has been a cause of several recent major power outages worldwide. Motivated by the industry need of effective algorithms of reactive power control planning to counteract voltage instability, this dissertation has developed a general framework for reactive power control planning to mitigate voltage instability and thus enhance the electric transmission system.; A backward/forward search algorithm with linear complexity is developed to select candidate locations of reactive power controls while satisfying power system performance requirements. A mixed integer programming based algorithm is presented for reactive power control planning to restore equilibria under severe contingencies. A mixed integer programming based algorithm of reactive power control planning is developed to increase post-contingency voltage stability margins. A systematic algorithm is developed to coordinate planning of static and dynamic reactive power control devices while satisfying the performance requirements of voltage stability margin and transient voltage dip. All the developed algorithms are implemented with MATLAB and tested on the New England 39-bus system. The simulation results obtained indicate that the developed approaches can be used to effectively plan reactive power control devices for transmission enhancement.