Theses and Dissertations
This collection includes both ASU Theses and Dissertations, submitted by graduate students, and the Barrett, Honors College theses submitted by undergraduate students.
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- All Subjects: Electric power system stability
- Creators: Vittal, Vijay
Description
Recent changes in the energy markets structure combined with the conti-nuous load growth have caused power systems to be operated under more stressed conditions. In addition, the nature of power systems has also grown more complex and dynamic because of the increasing use of long inter-area tie-lines and the high motor loads especially those comprised mainly of residential single phase A/C motors. Therefore, delayed voltage recovery, fast voltage collapse and short term voltage stability issues in general have obtained significant importance in relia-bility studies. Shunt VAr injection has been used as a countermeasure for voltage instability. However, the dynamic and fast nature of short term voltage instability requires fast and sufficient VAr injection, and therefore dynamic VAr devices such as Static VAr Compensators (SVCs) and STATic COMpensators (STAT-COMs) are used. The location and size of such devices are optimized in order to improve their efficiency and reduce initial costs. In this work time domain dy-namic analysis was used to evaluate trajectory voltage sensitivities for each time step. Linear programming was then performed to determine the optimal amount of required VAr injection at each bus, using voltage sensitivities as weighting factors. Optimal VAr injection values from different operating conditions were weighted and averaged in order to obtain a final setting of the VAr requirement. Some buses under consideration were either assigned very small VAr injection values, or not assigned any value at all. Therefore, the approach used in this work was found to be useful in not only determining the optimal size of SVCs, but also their location.
ContributorsSalloum, Ahmed (Author) / Vittal, Vijay (Thesis advisor) / Heydt, Gerald (Committee member) / Ayyanar, Raja (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
Description
Due to restructuring and open access to the transmission system, modern electric power systems are being operated closer to their operational limits. Additionally, the secure operational limits of modern power systems have become increasingly difficult to evaluate as the scale of the network and the number of transactions between utilities increase. To account for these challenges associated with the rapid expansion of electric power systems, dynamic equivalents have been widely applied for the purpose of reducing the computational effort of simulation-based transient security assessment. Dynamic equivalents are commonly developed using a coherency-based approach in which a retained area and an external area are first demarcated. Then the coherent generators in the external area are aggregated and replaced by equivalenced models, followed by network reduction and load aggregation. In this process, an improperly defined retained area can result in detrimental impacts on the effectiveness of the equivalents in preserving the dynamic characteristics of the original unreduced system. In this dissertation, a comprehensive approach has been proposed to determine an appropriate retained area boundary by including the critical generators in the external area that are tightly coupled with the initial retained area. Further-more, a systematic approach has also been investigated to efficiently predict the variation in generator slow coherency behavior when the system operating condition is subject to change. Based on this determination, the critical generators in the external area that are tightly coherent with the generators in the initial retained area are retained, resulting in a new retained area boundary. Finally, a novel hybrid dynamic equivalent, consisting of both a coherency-based equivalent and an artificial neural network (ANN)-based equivalent, has been proposed and analyzed. The ANN-based equivalent complements the coherency-based equivalent at all the retained area boundary buses, and it is designed to compensate for the discrepancy between the full system and the conventional coherency-based equivalent. The approaches developed have been validated on a large portion of the Western Electricity Coordinating Council (WECC) system and on a test case including a significant portion of the eastern interconnection.
ContributorsMa, Feng (Author) / Vittal, Vijay (Thesis advisor) / Tylavsky, Daniel (Committee member) / Heydt, Gerald (Committee member) / Si, Jennie (Committee member) / Ayyanar, Raja (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2011
Description
Contemporary methods for dynamic security assessment (DSA) mainly re-ly on time domain simulations to explore the influence of large disturbances in a power system. These methods are computationally intensive especially when the system operating point changes continually. The trajectory sensitivity method, when implemented and utilized as a complement to the existing DSA time domain simulation routine, can provide valuable insights into the system variation in re-sponse to system parameter changes. The implementation of the trajectory sensitivity analysis is based on an open source power system analysis toolbox called PSAT. Eight categories of sen-sitivity elements have been implemented and tested. The accuracy assessment of the implementation demonstrates the validity of both the theory and the imple-mentation. The computational burden introduced by the additional sensitivity equa-tions is relieved by two innovative methods: one is by employing a cluster to per-form the sensitivity calculations in parallel; the other one is by developing a mod-ified very dishonest Newton method in conjunction with the latest sparse matrix processing technology. The relation between the linear approximation accuracy and the perturba-tion size is also studied numerically. It is found that there is a fixed connection between the linear approximation accuracy and the perturbation size. Therefore this finding can serve as a general application guide to evaluate the accuracy of the linear approximation. The applicability of the trajectory sensitivity approach to a large realistic network has been demonstrated in detail. This research work applies the trajectory sensitivity analysis method to the Western Electricity Coordinating Council (WECC) system. Several typical power system dynamic security problems, in-cluding the transient angle stability problem, the voltage stability problem consid-ering load modeling uncertainty and the transient stability constrained interface real power flow limit calculation, have been addressed. Besides, a method based on the trajectory sensitivity approach and the model predictive control has been developed for determination of under frequency load shedding strategy for real time stability assessment. These applications have shown the great efficacy and accuracy of the trajectory sensitivity method in handling these traditional power system stability problems.
ContributorsHou, Guanji (Author) / Vittal, Vijay (Thesis advisor) / Heydt, Gerald (Committee member) / Tylavsky, Daniel (Committee member) / Si, Jennie (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
Voltage stability is always a major concern in power system operation. Recently Fault Induced Delayed Voltage Recovery (FIDVR) has gained increased attention. It is widely believed that the motor-driven loads of high efficiency, low inertia air conditioners are one of the main causes of FIDVR events. Simulation tools that assist power system operation and planning have been found insufficient to reproduce FIDVR events. This is because of their inaccurate load modeling of single-phase motor loads. Conventionally three-phase motor models have been used to represent the aggregation effect of single-phase motor load. However researchers have found that this modeling method is far from an accurate representation of single-phase induction motors. In this work a simulation method is proposed to study the precise influence of single-phase motor load in context of FIDVR. The load, as seen the transmission bus, is replaced with a detailed distribution system. Each single-phase motor in the distribution system is represented by an equipment-level model for best accuracy. This is to enable the simulation to capture stalling effects of air conditioner compressor motors as they are related to FIDVR events. The single phase motor models are compared against the traditional three phase aggregate approximation. Also different percentages of single-phase motor load are compared and analyzed. Simulation result shows that proposed method is able to reproduce FIDVR events. This method also provides a reasonable estimation of the power system voltage stability under the contingencies.
ContributorsMa, Yan (Author) / Karady, George G. (Thesis advisor) / Vittal, Vijay (Committee member) / Ayyanar, Raja (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
This thesis concerns with the impact of renewable generation resources on the power system stability. The rapidly increasing integration of renewable energy sources into the grid can change the way power systems operate and respond to system disturbances. This is because the available inertia from synchronous machines, which helps in damping system oscillations, gets reduced as an increase in renewables like wind and solar photovoltaics is accompanied by a decrease in conventional generators. This aspect of high penetration of renewables has the potential to affect the rotor angle stability and small signal stability of power systems. The system with increased renewables is mathematically modeled to rep-resent wind and solar resources. Transient and small signal stability studies are performed for various operating cases. The main conclusion drawn from the different studies is that increased renewable penetration causes a few instability problems, most of which are either localized and do not adversely affect the over-all system stability. It is also found that the critical inter-area modes of oscillations are sufficiently damped.
ContributorsSingh, Iknoor (Author) / Vittal, Vijay (Thesis advisor) / Ayyanar, Raja (Committee member) / Hedman, Kory (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
Electric power systems are facing great challenges from environmental regulations, changes in demand due to new technologies like electric vehicle, as well as the integration of various renewable energy sources. These factors taken together require the development of new tools to help make policy and investment decisions for the future power grid. The requirements of a network equivalent to be used in such planning tools are very different from those assumed in the development of traditional equivalencing procedures. This dissertation is focused on the development, implementation and verification of two network equivalencing approaches on large power systems, such as the Eastern Interconnection. Traditional Ward-type equivalences are a class of equivalencing approaches but this class has some significant drawbacks. It is well known that Ward-type equivalents "smear" the injections of external generators over a large number of boundary buses. For newer long-term investment applications that take into account such things as greenhouse gas (GHG) regulations and generator availability, it is computationally impractical to model fractions of generators located at many buses. A modified-Ward equivalent is proposed to address this limitation such that the external generators are moved wholesale to some internal buses based on electrical distance. This proposed equivalencing procedure is designed so that the retained-line power flows in the equivalent match those in the unreduced (full) model exactly. During the reduction process, accommodations for special system elements are addressed, including static VAr compensators (SVCs), high voltage dc (HVDC) transmission lines, and phase angle regulators. Another network equivalencing approach based on the dc power flow assumptions and the power transfer distribution factors (PTDFs) is proposed. This method, rather than eliminate buses via Gauss-reduction, aggregates buses on a zonal basis. The bus aggregation approach proposed here is superior to the existing bus aggregation methods in that a) under the base case, the equivalent-system inter-zonal power flows exactly match those calculated using the full-network-model b) as the operating conditions change, errors in line flows are reduced using the proposed bus clustering algorithm c) this method is computationally more efficient than other bus aggregation methods proposed heretofore. A critical step in achieving accuracy with a bus aggregation approach is selecting which buses to cluster together and how many clusters are needed. Clustering in this context refers to the process of partitioning a network into subsets of buses. An efficient network clustering method is proposed based on the PTDFs and the data mining techniques. This method is applied to the EI topology using the "Saguaro" supercomputer at ASU, a resource with sufficient memory and computational capability for handling this 60,000-bus and 80,000-branch system. The network equivalents generated by the proposed approaches are verified and tested for different operating conditions and promising results have been observed.
ContributorsShi, Di (Author) / Tylavsky, Daniel J (Thesis advisor) / Vittal, Vijay (Committee member) / Hedman, Kory (Committee member) / Ayyanar, Raja (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
In electric power systems, phasor measurement units (PMUs) are capable of providing synchronized voltage and current phasor measurements which are superior to conventional measurements collected by the supervisory control and data acquisition (SCADA) system in terms of resolution and accuracy. These measurements are known as synchrophasor measurements. Considerable research work has been done on the applications of PMU measurements based on the as-sumption that a high level of accuracy is obtained in the field. The study in this dissertation is conducted to address the basic issue concerning the accuracy of actual PMU measurements in the field. Synchronization is one of the important features of PMU measurements. However, the study presented in this dissertation reveals that the problem of faulty synchronization between measurements with the same time stamps from different PMUs exists. A Kalman filter model is proposed to analyze and calcu-late the time skew error caused by faulty synchronization. In order to achieve a high level of accuracy of PMU measurements, inno-vative methods are proposed to detect and identify system state changes or bad data which are reflected by changes in the measurements. This procedure is ap-plied as a key step in adaptive Kalman filtering of PMU measurements to over-come the insensitivity of a conventional Kalman filter. Calibration of PMU measurements is implemented in specific PMU instal-lation scenarios using transmission line (TL) parameters from operation planning data. The voltage and current correction factors calculated from the calibration procedure indicate the possible errors in PMU measurements. Correction factors can be applied in on-line calibration of PMU measurements. A study is conducted to address an important issue when integrating PMU measurements into state estimation. The reporting rate of PMU measurements is much higher than that of the measurements collected by the SCADA. The ques-tion of how to buffer PMU measurements is raised. The impact of PMU meas-urement buffer length on state estimation is discussed. A method based on hy-pothesis testing is proposed to determine the optimal buffer length of PMU meas-urements considering the two conflicting features of PMU measurements, i. e. un-certainty and variability. Results are presented for actual PMU synchrophasor measurements.
ContributorsZhang, Qing (Author) / Heydt, Gerald (Thesis advisor) / Vittal, Vijay (Thesis advisor) / Ayyanar, Raja (Committee member) / Si, Jennie (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2012
Description
ABSTRACT
This dissertation introduces a real-time topology monitoring scheme for power systems intended to provide enhanced situational awareness during major system disturbances. The topology monitoring scheme requires accurate real-time topology information to be effective. This scheme is supported by advances in transmission line outage detection based on data-mining phasor measurement unit (PMU) measurements.
A network flow analysis scheme is proposed to track changes in user defined minimal cut sets within the system. This work introduces a new algorithm used to update a previous network flow solution after the loss of a single system branch. The proposed new algorithm provides a significantly decreased solution time that is desired in a real- time environment. This method of topology monitoring can provide system operators with visual indications of potential problems in the system caused by changes in topology.
This work also presents a method of determining all singleton cut sets within a given network topology called the one line remaining (OLR) algorithm. During operation, if a singleton cut set exists, then the system cannot withstand the loss of any one line and still remain connected. The OLR algorithm activates after the loss of a transmission line and determines if any singleton cut sets were created. These cut sets are found using properties of power transfer distribution factors and minimal cut sets.
The topology analysis algorithms proposed in this work are supported by line outage detection using PMU measurements aimed at providing accurate real-time topology information. This process uses a decision tree (DT) based data-mining approach to characterize a lost tie line in simulation. The trained DT is then used to analyze PMU measurements to detect line outages. The trained decision tree was applied to real PMU measurements to detect the loss of a 500 kV line and had no misclassifications.
The work presented has the objective of enhancing situational awareness during significant system disturbances in real time. This dissertation presents all parts of the proposed topology monitoring scheme and justifies and validates the methodology using a real system event.
This dissertation introduces a real-time topology monitoring scheme for power systems intended to provide enhanced situational awareness during major system disturbances. The topology monitoring scheme requires accurate real-time topology information to be effective. This scheme is supported by advances in transmission line outage detection based on data-mining phasor measurement unit (PMU) measurements.
A network flow analysis scheme is proposed to track changes in user defined minimal cut sets within the system. This work introduces a new algorithm used to update a previous network flow solution after the loss of a single system branch. The proposed new algorithm provides a significantly decreased solution time that is desired in a real- time environment. This method of topology monitoring can provide system operators with visual indications of potential problems in the system caused by changes in topology.
This work also presents a method of determining all singleton cut sets within a given network topology called the one line remaining (OLR) algorithm. During operation, if a singleton cut set exists, then the system cannot withstand the loss of any one line and still remain connected. The OLR algorithm activates after the loss of a transmission line and determines if any singleton cut sets were created. These cut sets are found using properties of power transfer distribution factors and minimal cut sets.
The topology analysis algorithms proposed in this work are supported by line outage detection using PMU measurements aimed at providing accurate real-time topology information. This process uses a decision tree (DT) based data-mining approach to characterize a lost tie line in simulation. The trained DT is then used to analyze PMU measurements to detect line outages. The trained decision tree was applied to real PMU measurements to detect the loss of a 500 kV line and had no misclassifications.
The work presented has the objective of enhancing situational awareness during significant system disturbances in real time. This dissertation presents all parts of the proposed topology monitoring scheme and justifies and validates the methodology using a real system event.
ContributorsWerho, Trevor Nelson (Author) / Vittal, Vijay (Thesis advisor) / Heydt, Gerald (Committee member) / Hedman, Kory (Committee member) / Karady, George G. (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2015
Description
This dissertation presents innovative techniques to develop performance-based models and complete transient models of induction motor drive systems with vector controls in electro-magnetic transient (EMT) and positive sequence transient stability (PSTS) simulation programs. The performance-based model is implemented by obtaining the characteristic transfer functions of perturbed active and reactive power consumptions with respect to frequency and voltage perturbations. This level of linearized performance-based model is suitable for the investigation of the damping of small-magnitude low-frequency oscillations. The complete transient model is proposed by decomposing the motor, converter and control models into d-q axes components and developing a compatible electrical interface to the positive-sequence network in the PSTS simulators. The complete transient drive model is primarily used to examine the system response subject to transient voltage depression considering increasing penetration of converter-driven motor loads.
For developing the performance-based model, modulations are performed on the supply side of the full drive system to procure magnitude and phase responses of active and reactive powers with respect to the supply voltage and frequency for a range of discrete frequency points. The prediction error minimization (PEM) technique is utilized to generate the curve-fitted transfer functions and corresponding bode plots. For developing the complete drive model in the PSTS simulation program, a positive-sequence voltage source is defined properly as the interface of the model to the external system. The dc-link of the drive converter is implemented by employing the average model of the PWM converter, and is utilized to integrate the line-side rectifier and machine-side inverter.
Numerical simulation is then conducted on sample test systems, synthesized with suitable characteristics to examine performance of the developed models. The simulation results reveal that with growing amount of drive loads being distributed in the system, the small-signal stability of the system is improved in terms of the desirable damping effects on the low-frequency system oscillations of voltage and frequency. The transient stability of the system is also enhanced with regard to the stable active power and reactive power controls of the loads, and the appropriate VAr support capability provided by the drive loads during a contingency.
For developing the performance-based model, modulations are performed on the supply side of the full drive system to procure magnitude and phase responses of active and reactive powers with respect to the supply voltage and frequency for a range of discrete frequency points. The prediction error minimization (PEM) technique is utilized to generate the curve-fitted transfer functions and corresponding bode plots. For developing the complete drive model in the PSTS simulation program, a positive-sequence voltage source is defined properly as the interface of the model to the external system. The dc-link of the drive converter is implemented by employing the average model of the PWM converter, and is utilized to integrate the line-side rectifier and machine-side inverter.
Numerical simulation is then conducted on sample test systems, synthesized with suitable characteristics to examine performance of the developed models. The simulation results reveal that with growing amount of drive loads being distributed in the system, the small-signal stability of the system is improved in terms of the desirable damping effects on the low-frequency system oscillations of voltage and frequency. The transient stability of the system is also enhanced with regard to the stable active power and reactive power controls of the loads, and the appropriate VAr support capability provided by the drive loads during a contingency.
ContributorsLiu, Yuan (Author) / Vittal, Vijay (Thesis advisor) / Undrill, John (Committee member) / Ayyanar, Raja (Committee member) / Qin, Jiangchao (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2016
Description
Two significant trends of recent power system evolution are: (1) increasing installa-tion of dynamic loads and distributed generation resources in distribution systems; (2) large-scale renewable energy integration at the transmission system level. A majority of these devices interface with power systems through power electronic converters. However, existing transient stability (TS) simulators are inadequate to represent the dynamic behavior of these devices accurately. On the other hand, simulating a large system using an electromagnetic transient (EMT) simulator is computationally impractical. EMT-TS hybrid simulation approach is an alternative to address these challenges. Furthermore, to thoroughly analyze the increased interactions among the transmission and distribution systems, an integrated modeling and simulation approach is essential.
The thesis is divided into three parts. The first part focuses on an improved hybrid simulation approach and software development. Compared to the previous work, the pro-posed approach has three salient features: three-sequence TS simulation algorithm, three-phase/three-sequence network equivalencing and flexible switching of the serial and par-allel interaction protocols.
The second part of the thesis concentrates on the applications of the hybrid simula-tion tool. The developed platform is first applied to conduct a detailed fault-induced de-layed voltage recovery (FIDVR) study on the Western Electricity Coordinating Council (WECC) system. This study uncovers that after a normally cleared single line to ground fault at the transmission system could cause air conditioner motors to stall in the distribu-tion systems, and the motor stalling could further propagate to an unfaulted phase under certain conditions. The developed tool is also applied to simulate power systems inter-faced with HVDC systems, including classical HVDC and the new generation voltage source converter (VSC)-HVDC system.
The third part centers on the development of integrated transmission and distribution system simulation and an advanced hybrid simulation algorithm with a capability of switching from hybrid simulation mode to TS simulation. Firstly, a modeling framework suitable for integrated transmission and distribution systems is proposed. Secondly, a power flow algorithm and a diakoptics based dynamic simulation algorithm for the integrated transmission and distribution system are developed. Lastly, the EMT-TS hybrid simulation algorithm is combined with the diakoptics based dynamic simulation algorithm to realize flexible simulation mode switching to increase the simulation efficiency.
The thesis is divided into three parts. The first part focuses on an improved hybrid simulation approach and software development. Compared to the previous work, the pro-posed approach has three salient features: three-sequence TS simulation algorithm, three-phase/three-sequence network equivalencing and flexible switching of the serial and par-allel interaction protocols.
The second part of the thesis concentrates on the applications of the hybrid simula-tion tool. The developed platform is first applied to conduct a detailed fault-induced de-layed voltage recovery (FIDVR) study on the Western Electricity Coordinating Council (WECC) system. This study uncovers that after a normally cleared single line to ground fault at the transmission system could cause air conditioner motors to stall in the distribu-tion systems, and the motor stalling could further propagate to an unfaulted phase under certain conditions. The developed tool is also applied to simulate power systems inter-faced with HVDC systems, including classical HVDC and the new generation voltage source converter (VSC)-HVDC system.
The third part centers on the development of integrated transmission and distribution system simulation and an advanced hybrid simulation algorithm with a capability of switching from hybrid simulation mode to TS simulation. Firstly, a modeling framework suitable for integrated transmission and distribution systems is proposed. Secondly, a power flow algorithm and a diakoptics based dynamic simulation algorithm for the integrated transmission and distribution system are developed. Lastly, the EMT-TS hybrid simulation algorithm is combined with the diakoptics based dynamic simulation algorithm to realize flexible simulation mode switching to increase the simulation efficiency.
ContributorsHuang, Qiuhua (Author) / Vittal, Vijay (Thesis advisor) / Undrill, John M. (Committee member) / Heydt, Gerald T. (Committee member) / Ayyanar, Raja (Committee member) / Arizona State University (Publisher)
Created2016