USING NETWORK RECONFIGURATION AS A TOOL FOR MITIGATING VOLTAGE SAGS IN PRACTICAL DISTRIBUTION SYSTEMS

Abstract

Voltage magnitude is one of the major factors that influence the quality of power supply. In this paper a practical method is presented for mitigating voltage sag in power distribution systems by means of network reconfiguration. The method initially identifies the weak areas in the system when it is subjected to faults in the system. Then it tries to reconfigure the network by locating the weak areas as far away as possible from the main source. Network reconfiguration is implemented by changing the opening and closing switching status of the switches in a network. A practical test distribution system is analyzed and reconfigured to illustrate the applicability of the proposed method.  The results proved that the proposed voltage sag mitigation method can improve the system voltage profile during faults and hence decrease the use of voltage sag mitigation devices.  Such a technique can be used to improve power quality and reliability of power distribution networks