“TRAINING ON ELECTRICAL POWER

SYSTEM STUDIES USING PSS/E”

CONVERGENCE ISSUES
BASIC COURSE (WEEK 1 DAY 2-F)

USAID’s SUSTAINABLE ENERGY FOR

PAKISTAN (SEP) PROJECT
 Available Iteration Schemes in PSS/E

• Gauss-Seidel
• Modified Gauss-Seidel handles series capacitors
• Full Newton-Raphson
• Decoupled Newton-Raphson
• Fixed-Slope Decoupled Newton-Raphson
 Load Flow Fail to Converge

• Any of these five methods can fail to converge on the

solution of some problems
• Impossible to solve with a single iterative method but
the non-converge load flow can be solved by more
than one method and depend on the problems
 General Guide (1)

• The Gauss-Seidel methods are generally suitable for:

➢ Network with poor voltage distribution or starting
voltage estimates
➢ Difficulties with generator reactive power
allocation
➢ Not converge in situations where real power
transfers are close to the limits of the system
 General Guide (2)

• The Newton-Raphson methods are generally tolerant

for:
➢ There are difficulties in transferring real power
➢ Prone to non-converge if there are difficulties in
the allocation of generator reactive power and with
poor starting voltage estimate
 General Guide (3)

• Experimentation is needed to determine the optimum

combination of iterative methods for each particular
power system model
Steps to Solve Non-Converge Load Flow

• Make sure that there is no data errors or configuration

problems in load flow case
• Experience suggests the following steps:
➢ Use flat start (Initialize all voltages to 1.0 p.u and
phase angles zero)
Steps to Solve Non-Converge Load Flow
➢ Execute Gauss-Seidel iterations until the
adjustments to the voltage estimates decrease to,
say, 0.01 or 0.005 p.u in both real and imaginary
parts
➢ Switch to Newton-Raphson iterations until the
problem is converged, if not
➢ Switch back to Gauss-Seidel iterations if the
Newton-Raphson method does not settle down to
a smooth convergence within 8 to 10 iterations
Example How to Solve Non-Convergence Case
Example How to Solve Non-Convergence Case
Example How to Solve Non-Convergence Case
Example How to Solve Non-Convergence Case
Example How to Solve Non-Convergence Case
Solving Through Non-Divergent Solution
• The non-divergent Newton power
flow solution option attempts to
terminate the iterative procedure
before divergent iterations have
driven the voltage vector to a state
where large mismatches and
unrealistic voltages are present
• It provides a relatively good indication
of the state of the network. In
particular, voltage collapse situations
can be identified by localized areas of
bus mismatches and low voltages,
with the remainder of the network
converged