1

Application of STATCOM for Power Quality

Improvement
Sercan Teleke Atousa Yazdani Bhavya Gudimetla Johan Enslin Juan Castaneda

AbstractThe application of a STATCOM can help to

alleviate some of the power quality issues encountered within a
refinery consisting of large induction machine loads. The intent
of this paper is to demonstrate the improvements obtained with
STATCOM for this purpose and also to evaluate economical
benefits obtained with it. First, the paper identifies the power
quality and other issues around the refinery in the Southern
California Edison system. Computer simulations show that the
application of a STATCOM can help the big motor load to
survive under the most severe contingencies occurring in the
area. The analysis also demonstrates that the STATCOM with
appropriate controller can be very effective in harmonic
reduction.
Index TermsSTATCOM, induction machine, vector control,
harmonic compensation.

I. INTRODUCTION

UANTA TECHNOLOGY and Southern California

Edison (SCE) are working together on a research project
with the support of the California Energy Commission (CEC).
The project has multiple objectives and this paper addresses
grid power quality and other issues; and assesses potential
improvements on the grid at the selected interconnection
location by providing FACTS devices with bidirectional
control of reactive power.
This paper is based on measurements from a refinery in the
Southern California Edison electric power system. This
section describes the system and STATic synchronous
COMpensators (STATCOM) models, and software tools used
during the studies. Section II of the paper includes the
characterization of the key problems in the area and provides
measurements from the refinery. Section III presents the
results and the benefits obtained from the application of
STATCOM. The economic evaluation is done in Section IV.
Conclusions and next steps in the project are presented in
Section V.
A. Description of the study area within SCE
The studies performed are based on two software tools:
PSLF and PSCAD. The PSLF model is an SCE system wide
software used for bulk power system analysis. The 2010 year
SCE PSLF base case is used for developing the PSCAD case
in which the dynamic simulations are performed.
The PSCAD case was obtained from SCE and it did not
S. Teleke (steleke@quanta-technology.com), A. Yazdani, B. Gudimetla, J.
Enslin are with Quanta Technology, 4020 Westchase Blvd. Suite 300,
Raleigh, NC, 27607. Juan Castaneda is with Southern California Edison.

978-1-61284-788-7/11/$26.00 2011 IEEE

contain any loads. This case was essentially a representation

of the key buses around the refinery and the rest of the SCE
system is represented by an equivalent.
Using the PSLF 2010 base case, the inductive and resistive
loads were added to the PSCAD case accordingly. The total
load added to the system was about 800 MW and 90 MVAR.
After that, the transformer tap settings were changed in order
to make the voltage levels as close as possible to the PSLF
case. After the modifications, the power flows in PSCAD
were compared with the PSLF case and the difference in the
power flows were within 10% for each line.
Since the refinery bus load consists of motor loads in
reality, the next step in the PSCAD modeling part was to
replace the resistive and inductive load at the refinery bus with
induction motors in order to represent various
compressor/fan/pump loads existing at that bus.
To represent the motor load at the refinery bus in PSCAD,
the squirrel cage induction machine is used and the load
torque is set to be proportional to speed square in order to
represent compressor/fan/pump load. The motor is connected
to the low voltage side of 150 MVA 66kV/13.8kV
transformer. The total load at the refinery bus is around 107
MW and in order to reach this power level, it is assumed that
144 induction machines connected in parallel as an aggregated
motor load. The details of this aggregated motor load are
given in Table 1.
Table 1: Parameters of the aggregated motor load

Parameter
Rated RMS Phase Voltage
Rated RMS Phase Current
Horse Power
Number of Coherent Machines
Polar Moment of Inertia (J=2H)
Load Torque
Stator Resistance
First Cage Resistance
Second Cage Resistance
Stator Unsaturated Leakage Reactance
Rotor Unsaturated Mutual Reactance
Unsaturated Magnetizing Reactance
Second Cage Unsaturated Reactance

Value
7.967 kV
31.25 A
1000 hp
144
400 (MWs/MVA)
0.96*2 pu.
0.015 pu.
0.0507 pu.
0.0062 pu.
0.091 pu.
0.1418 pu.
6.319 pu.
0.0539 pu.

B. STATCOM Modeling
There is a considerable amount of literature on the theory,
modeling, control, and applications of STATCOM [1]-[5].
The STATCOM is based on a solid-state voltage source
converter, implemented with an inverter and connected in
shunt with the power system through a coupling reactor, in
analogy with a synchronous machine. The STATCOM is
generating a balanced set of three sinusoidal voltages at the
fundamental frequency, with a controllable amplitude and
phase-shift angle [6]. The major system component of the
STATCOM is a three phase PWM forced commutated voltage
sourced inverter shown in Fig. 1 [7].

Table 2: Parameters of the STATCOM

Parameter
Continuous Rating
Transient Overload Rating

Value
15 MVAR
2.5 x continuous rating for 2
seconds
1 pu.
4%
0.5

Voltage reference
Droop
Voltage control proportional
gain
Voltage control integral time
constant

0.004065 sec

The simplified control block diagram for STATCOM is

seen in Fig. 3.

Fig. 1: Main circuit of STATCOM

If the line voltage is in phase with the converter output

voltage and has the same magnitude, then there can be no
current flow into or out of the STATCOM. If the converter
voltage is increased, then the voltage difference between the
converter output and the line voltage appears on the reactance.
As a result, a leading current with respect to the line voltage is
drawn and the STATCOM behaves as a capacitor and
generates VARs. Conversely, if the converter output voltage
becomes less than the line voltage, then the STATCOM draws
a lagging current, behaving as an inductor, and absorbs VARs.
A STATCOM operates essentially like a synchronous
condenser where the excitation may be greater or less than the
terminal voltage [8]. The U-I characteristic of a STATCOM
is shown in Fig. 2.

Fig. 3: Simplified STATCOM control block diagram

The STATCOM has different control modes for voltage

regulation and harmonic distortion.
The control strategy of STATCOM in voltage regulation
mode is shown in Fig. 4. Vector control technique is employed
as the control strategy [9], [10]. The vector control technique
provides fast control of the d-axis and q-axis currents, id and
iq. These currents in turn mainly determine the real and
reactive power output of the STATCOM, as
3
3
(1)
P = U i ; Q = U i
o

d d

d q

provided that Ud is aligned with the terminal voltage.

Fig. 2: U-I characteristic of STATCOM

A 6 pulse voltage source inverter with the parameters

tabulated in Table 2, is used as STATCOM for this study.

Fig. 4: STATCOM controller block diagram for voltage regulation

In voltage regulation mode, the STATCOM absorbs/injects

reactive power in order to regulate the bus voltage to the
voltage reference value that is set in the controller. The
voltage regulation is done by controlling the q axis current
which controls the reactive power flow. The d-axis current
loop is used to regulate the DC link voltage.
Fig. 5 shows a simplified block diagram of the STATCOM
controller in harmonic compensation mode. The output of the
controller is the reference current that needs to be injected by
STATCOM. The input to the controller is ac voltage at the
connection bus (VABC) and harmonic load three phase ac
current (IABC) [11], [12].

1.00

0.75

0.50

0.25

0.00
THD

H10

H20

H30

H40

H50

C-A VHarm

Total RMS:
DC Level:
Fundamental(H1) RMS:
Total Harmonic Distortion THD:

38408.16 V
0.00 V
0.00 V
1.13 %FND (Even: 0.01 %FND, Odd: 1.13 %FND)
Created with DranView 6.8.1

Fig. 7: Voltage harmonic spectrum at the refinery bus

III. APPLICATION OF STATCOM

STATCOM is a promising technology for power quality
application because it can control the grid voltage rapidly and
improve the power quality [13]-[15]. Hence, in order to
address the power quality issues such as voltage sag
mitigation and harmonic compensation, STATCOM is
connected to the refinery bus. Fig. 8 shows the application of
STATCOM at the refinery.
Fig. 5: STATCOM controller block diagram for harmonic
compensation

II. CHARACTERIZATION OF PROBLEMS AT SYSTEM UNDER

STUDY AREA

SCE personnel provided measurements from the refinery

for the study. The measurements obtained cover a period from
2/1/2010 to 2/7/2010. This data provided some insight to the
power quality issues in the study area.
A typical voltage sag occurring at the refinery is shown in
Fig. 6. It is seen that the voltage drops to 90% of the nominal
value during the sag which lasts for 1 sec.
The worst case harmonic spectrum of the voltage obtained
at the refinery is shown in Fig. 7. This figure shows the THD
occurring in the measurement period. It is seen that the worst
case voltage THD is 1.2 % during the weekly long
measurements.
Dran-V iew 6.8.01 HASP : 15952223 92 (5F152978h)

65000

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65000

Tim eplot

63000

62000

63000

62000

Volts C-A Vrms (val)

64000

Volts B-C Vrms (val)

Volts A-B Vrms (val)

65000

64000

63000

61000
62000

61000

60000
61000
10:48:10.0
02/06/2010
Saturday

10:48:10.5

10:48:11.0

A-B Vrm s (v al)

B-C Vrm s (v al)

10:48:11.5

10:48:12.0

C-A Vrm s (v al)

Event #1 at 02/ 04/2010 10:42:59.800

Timed

Fig. 6: Voltage sag occurring at the refinery bus

Although the measured data is well within the IEEE 519

standard during this measurement period, previously some
power quality concerns were identified at this location in the
SCE system.

Fig. 8: Application of STATCOM at the refinery

A. Voltage Regulation
In order to show the effectiveness of STATCOM in voltage
regulation and contingency support, a three phase to ground
fault is created in one of the lines that is close to the refinery.
The fault is set to occur at t=3.5 sec and cleared after 0.5 sec.
Fig. 9 shows the refinery bus voltage during the fault with
and without STATCOM. It is seen that the STATCOM helps
to bring the voltage back to its nominal value within 1.5 sec
whereas the voltage doesnt reach the nominal value back
without the STATCOM.

B. Harmonic Compensation
This section presents the application of STATCOM for
harmonic compensation. For this purpose, a harmonic current
source is connected to the refinery bus. The harmonic content
of this source is given in Table 3.
Fig. 12 shows the THD and harmonic content of the voltage
at Refinery without STATCOM. It is seen that the THD is
about 6%.
Fig. 13 shows the THD and harmonic content with
STATCOM. The THD decreases to 1% with STATCOM
which corresponds to an 82% reduction in THD.
Fig. 9: Refinery Bus Voltage (pu.) with (blue) and without (orange)
STATCOM

Table 3: Harmonic current injection at refinery

Harmonic Content

Percentage of the fundamental Current

%

0.057143

0.125714

0.137143

64.61714

0.411429

29.08571

0.034286

10

0.331429

11

3.314286

17

16.72

19

0.754286

Fig. 10 shows the active and reactive power of the

STATCOM. It can be observed that the STATCOM injects
around 37 MVAR during the fault and around 22 MVAR after
the fault to bring the voltage back to nominal value. It is also
seen that no active power is injected since there is no energy
storage device connected.

Fig. 10: STATCOM Active (MW-blue) and Reactive Power

(MVAR-orange)

Fig. 11 shows the speed of the induction machine with and

without STATCOM. As can be seen, the induction machine
collapses for the case without STATCOM whereas it survives
with the help of STATCOM.

Voltage THD (%)

6.0

Individual HDs (%)

5.0

0.0

0.0

[1] 5.87756

[17] 0.735353

Fig. 12: THD and harmonic contents (%) without STATCOM

Voltage THD (%)
6.0

Individual HDs (%)

5.0

Fig. 11: Induction machine speed (pu.) with (blue) and without
(orange) STATCOM

By looking at Fig. 10 and Fig. 11, it can be concluded that

the reactive power injected by STATCOM during and after
the fault helps the induction machine to recover its speed and
reach to rated value within 1 sec after the fault is cleared.

0.0

0.0

[1] 1.08447

[17] 0.211519

Fig. 13: THD and harmonic contents (%) with STATCOM

The STATCOM in harmonic compensation mode acts as an

Active Power Filter (APF) and compensate the harmonic
currents injected by the harmonic current source shown in
Table 3. Fig. 14 shows the harmonic load current and the
current injected by STATCOM. It is seen that the STATCOM
can inject currents similar to the harmonic current source with
opposite polarity easily and eliminate most of the harmonic
content.

IV. ECONOMIC EVALUATION

The results of the case studies performed in the previous
section identified that addition of STATCOM prevents motor
from stalling, helped in voltage sag and harmonics mitigation.
This section presents the economic analysis of addition of a
STATCOM versus a STATCOM integrated with an energy
storage system.
In order to calculate the return on investment (ROI) for
STATCOM, it is assumed that the total cost of 15 MVAR
STATCOM is $5M and the value streams considered are
voltage regulation, voltage sag and harmonics mitigation. The
result of value stream calculation is shown in Table 4.

Fig. 14: Load Current (kA) (Blue) and STATCOM Current (kA)
(Red)
Table 4: Value Stream Calculation for BESS

Avoided
Cost

Value Stream
Voltage Regulation [16]
Local Voltage Support
[17]
Power Quality
(Harmonics) [18]

30.00
25512.00
1889.67

Unit
$/hp
$/voltage
sag
$/MW

Explanation of Calculation

Yearly Avoided
Cost ($)

20% reduction in maintenance cost for

induction machines

$860,590.00

6 sags/year

$153,072.00

107 MW load
Total Avoided Cost per year
ROI in one year

The analysis shows that the return on investment for

STATCOM is about 24% in the first year based on the
selected applications for the STATCOM.
V. CONCLUSIONS
This paper has presented the application of STATCOM and
associated value of utilizing dynamic reactive power support
to help alleviate power quality issues occurring in the location.
From the results of the study, it is seen that:
The aggregated motor load (mainly induction machines)
at the refinery bus will collapse after a nearby fault if there is
no reactive support
The application of STATCOM will help the aggregated
motor load to recover without stalling and reach to rated
value, after the fault is cleared by supplying reactive power
during and after the fault
STATCOM can also be used to reduce the harmonic
current and it can decrease the THD by 80% in the APF
operating mode
The ROI for STATCOM in one year is around 24%

$202,194.69
$1,215,856.69
24.32%

At the time of this writing, the study team is currently

performing other studies within the SCE system and
investigating potential solutions for the problems at these
locations.
VI. ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This paper has been supported in part by funds from the
California Energy Commission.
VII. REFERENCES
[1]
[2]
[3]

[4]
[5]

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6
[6]
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[18]

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VIII. BIOGRAPHIES
Sercan Teleke (S08-M10) was born in Ankara,
Turkey, in 1983. He received the B.S. degree in
electrical and electronics engineering from Middle
East Technical University, Ankara, in 2005, the M.S.
degree in electric power engineering from Chalmers
University of Technology, Goteborg, in 2006 and the
Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering from North
Carolina State University, Raleigh, in 2009. He is
currently with Quanta Technology. His research
interests are in the areas of energy storage, power
electronics applications to power systems, and integration of renewable
energy sources using energy storage.

Atousa Yazdani has more than 8 years of experience

in power engineering modeling and design. She is an
expert in power system analysis and power
electronics and their application in power system and
power quality analysis. Prior to joining Quanta, she
was working as a design engineer and design project
leader. Her experience as a design engineer has been
focused in the area of HV substations, hydroelectric
power plants, and industrial facilities, specifically in
the oil and petroleum market. She received her Ph.D.
degree in electrical engineering from Missouri University of Science and
Technology (MS&T formerly Univ. of Missouri-Rolla) in 2008. She is an
active member of IEEE and is the author /coauthor of several journal papers,
conference publications and technical articles. Her main interests include
modeling and design of power system and applications of power electronic
apparatus and FACTS devices in power systems.

Bhavya Gudimetla is an Electrical Engineer in the

Sustainable department at Quanta Technology. She
received her bachelors degree in electrical and
electronics engineering from JNTU, India, in 2006,
the M.S. degree in electric power engineering from
Oklahoma State University, Stillwater, in 2008. She
has expertise in system planning, wind and solar
electric conversion systems, capacity credit and
reliability analysis. She also has a broad background
in power electronics applications to power systems
and system reliability evaluation.

Johan Enslin (M85, SM00) is Vice President of Sustainable department of

Quanta Technology. He is an expert on the interconnection issues of largescale, on-shore and offshore wind parks and solar farms to the high and
medium voltage electrical grids. These include feasibility, system impacts,
interconnection options, dynamic modelling, stability, transient, network grid
upgrades, power balancing and harmonic system studies for different on- and
offshore grid topologies using HVDC, HVAC and energy storage
technologies. Previously he also designed, developed and commercialized
back-to-back converters for wind and solar generators.

Juan Castaneda (M00) is a Senior Electrical Engineer in the Grid Advance

Department of the T&D Business Unit at Southern California Edison. He has
been at SCE for six years. As a studies engineer, he has conducted
electromagnetic transients studies (EMTP-type computer simulations) for
several transmission projects as well as failure analysis of high voltage
equipment. He has also worked in the area of dynamic protection relay testing
using time domain computer simulations. Juan received his Electrical
Engineering Degree from California State University Long Beach (CSULB)
in 1998 and a Master in Electrical Engineering from the University of
Southern California (USC) in 2008. He is a registered professional engineer in
the State of California and a member of the IEEE and PES societies.