Design and Simulation of Power Factor Correction Using D-STATCOM (case study on Almeda Textile Factory)

Abstract

Textile Industry is one of the most important industries in Ethiopia. Those industry suffers from power factor problem’s. As the other textile industries, Almeda textile factory has a problem of low power factor in which this low power factor should be corrected. Power factor correction is the main consideration for utilities and large power consumers as low power factor increases the ratings of distribution and generation equipment resulting in large expense for both the supplier and consumer. The low power factor is highly undesirable as it causes an increase in current, resulting in additional losses of active power in all the elements of power system. In order to ensure most favorable conditions for a supply system, it is important to have power factor as close to unity as possible. This condition is attained by shunt a preferable power factor corrector equipment near to the load area. The low power factor of the factory is assessed or checked by direct measurement of load power factor using power stability recorder, from recorded data and from the samples of power factor charged bills of Almeda textile factory, which is charged by Ethiopian electric utility. To solve the low power factor of the factory, this thesis have designed and simulated a fact controller three-leg voltage source converter (VSC) D-STATCOM (distribution Static Synchronous Compensator) that, is connected in shunt at the three-phase power entrance of the factory in parallel to the load. A VSC based D-STATCOM is used for the compensation of reactive power for power factor correction, voltage regulation, to eliminate unbalancing load current, and elimination of harmonic currents at the point of common coupling. For this system, this thesis objective is to improve the power factor of the factory from presently operating 0.66 lagging to between 0.85 and 0.95 lagging. The system simulated a D-STATCOM employing a Synchronously Rotating Reference Frame (SRF) theory, which is modeled and simulated in MATLAB Simulink software. This design enabled to maintain power factor of the factory between 0.85 to 0.95 all times whilst keeping the load bus voltage at one per unit. These goals were, fully accomplished in MATLAB simulation and MATLAB coding software’s. Now, depend on the different MATlab simulation results, the Almeda textile factory load power factor has been improved from 0.66 to 0.92 lagging which is within the designed range of the thesis objective. The active and reactive power components of the system act as completely independently during changes in the system