Utilizing STATCOM for power quality improvement under integration of wind farms into the unified grid

Abstract

Wind power plants play an important role in the power system especially under integration of high penetration levels of wind energy into grid. Many requirements for the wind power plants have been proposed in Saudi Arabia Grid Code. One of these requirements is power quality including active and reactive powers, flicker, voltage swell, harmonics and voltage sag. These power quality aspects are generated due to the variation in the environmental conditions as all fluctuations in the wind speed are further transferred as fluctuations in the electrical power delivered to the grid especially in fixed speed wind turbines. Also the problem is that these wind turbines mostly use induction generators, tend to drain large amounts of VArs from the grid, potentially causing low voltage and may be voltage stability problems for the utility. This paper presents the practical solutions to mitigate the voltage fluctuations caused by the aerodynamic aspects of a wind farm in a power system by utilizing a Static Compensator (STATCOM). Also Recommendations are given for improving the voltage profile and reactive power of the wind farms connected to the grid during short circuit using different STATCOM techniques for a safe operation.