OPTIMAL PLACEMENT OF SVC TO MINIMIZE LOSS AND

IMPROVE VOLTAGE PROFILE UNDER POWER SYSTEM

CONTINGENCY USING GA
1
NEELAMBAR SINGH CHAUHAN, 2N.V.SRIKANTH, 3B.VIJAY KUMAR
1
M.Tech Student, 2Associate Professor, Dept of Electrical Engg, Warangal
3
Phd Scholar,Dept of Electrical Engg NIT Warangal

Abstract- The emergence of FACTS technology has been of great help in improving the operation of power systems as it
reduces the power system instability problem, reduces losses and voltage deviation. Due to huge investments associated with
FACTS devices, proper planning in early stages of commissioning is necessary so as to attain maximum possible use from
them. Placing FACTS devices at proper locations can serve the purpose of improving voltage levels and reducing losses in the
system. In this paper, Genetic Algorithm is used to find optimum location of Static VAR Compensator which reduces power
loss, voltage deviation, considering most severe contingencies. Contingency ranking is done by finding Voltage performance
Index (VPI). IEEE 30 bus system is used to demonstrate the methodology.

Index Terms- SVC, FACTS, GA, real power Loss, placement, size.

I. INTRODUCTION
Power system networks are complex systems that are
nonlinear, non-stationary, and prone to disturbances
and faults. Reinforcement of a power system can be
accomplished by improving the voltage profile,
increasing the transmission capacity, loss
minimization and others.
(STATCOM), unified power flow controller (UPFC)
etc. [2]. In the case of voltage support, shunt FACTS
devices, such as STATCOM and SVC are typically
used. The commonly used shunt FACTS device in
power system networks is SVC due to its
comparatively lower cost as compared to its
counterpart i.e. STATCOM.

Increase in power demand due to increase in
population requires the existing transmission
networks to carry more power. Therefore, controlling
the power flow in the network is an important issue in
the planning and operation of power system. The
improved system power flow control and increased
transmission capacity can be obtained using Flexible
AC transmission system (FACTS) [1].
FACTS devices are basically power electronics based
converters which are capable to control various
parameters' of power system networks in electric
transmission circuits to provide facility of better
control for both steady state power flow as well as
dynamic stability control. The FACTS devices can be
categorized into three types, such as series controllers,
shunt controllers and combined series-shunt
controllers. In principle, the series controllers inject
voltage in series with the line and the shunt controllers
inject current into the system at the point of
connection. The combined series-shunt controllers
inject current into the system with the shunt part of the
controllers and voltage in series in the line with the
series part of the controllers. FACTs devices include
Thyristor controlled series compensator (TCSC),
static VAR compensator (SVC), static compensator
Objectives of shunt compensators are Steady-state
transmittable power can be increased and the voltage
profile along the line controlled by appropriate
reactive shunt compensation. Shunt connected, fixed
or mechanically switched reactors are applied to
minimize line overvoltage under light load conditions,
and shunt connected, fixed or mechanically switched
capacitors are applied to maintain voltage levels under
heavy load conditions.
The primary objective of applying a Static VAR
Compensator in a power system is to increase the
power transmission capability, with a given
transmission network, from the generators to the
loads. Since Static VAR Compensators cannot
generate or absorb real power, the power transmission
of the system is affected indirectly by voltage control.
That is, the reactive output power (capacitive or
inductive) of the compensator is varied to control the
voltage at given terminals of the transmission network
so as to maintain the desired power flow under
possible system disturbances and contingencies. The
installation of SVC at a proper location, also results in
reducing system power losses significantly. In
literature several methodologies and approaches have
been reported to find out the optimal location of SVC

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 Optimal Placement of SVC to Minimize Loss and Improve Voltage Profile under Power System Contingency using GA

in the power system network using different

techniques such as genetic algorithm (GA), simulated
annealing (SA), artificial immune system (AIS) and
particle swarm optimization (PSO) [3,4]. The SA
based approach is proposed to determine the location,
sizes and types of VAR sources and their settings at
different loading conditions [5]. Considering the
operational constraints, the total cost i.e. purchase
cost, installation cost and cost of energy loss are
minimized for the overall life of the VAR sources [5].
In [6], GA is employed for optimal placement of only
one SVC within a power system for reducing power
loss and minimize size of SVC.

AIS technique has been applied to place SVC

optimally for improving the system voltage profile and
for minimizing the total losses [7]. In [8], PSO based
approach has been applied for finding optimal III. PROBLEM FORMULATION
locations of SVCs in the IEEE 30 bus systems. A new
BIG BANG-BIG CRUNCH (BB-BC) optimization In this paper, single line outages are considered as
algorithm was used for finding optimal size of FACTS contingencies for optimal placement of SVC and the
device for improvement of voltage stability limit, severity of a contingency has been evaluated using
voltage profile and loss minimization under normal Voltage Performance Index [11] has been used as:
and line outage contingency conditions. The BBBC
algorithm required less number of operators similar to
PSO. The BB-BC algorithm provided better
performance and good convergence characteristics as eq. 1
compared to PSO.
where, is absolute arithmetic difference
In this paper GA is used for finding Optimal location between the voltage magnitude under line outage and
and sizing of SVC to minimizing real power loss,
reducing voltage deviation and to reduce size of SVC. base case condition; is bus voltage
Most severe contingency are determined by magnitude selected by the utility engineers to specify
contingency ranking, using Voltage Performance how much they think is permissible limit for an outage
index (VPI). GA is used for solving Optimization case. In this paper, has been considered as
problem of placement of SVC. IEEE 30 bus system is 0.2 p.u. and the value of the exponent m has been
used to demonstrate the effectiveness of methodology. taken as 2.

II. FACTS DEVICES A. Minimization of real power loss

The real power loss (PL) as fIrst term of objective
FACTS devices can be used to provide reactive power function F1 (u, v) is defined as:
compensation and also to minimize loss in power
system contingencies. In this paper, FACTS devices PL =
have been considered: SVC (Static VAR eq. 2
Compensator). Where, NTL and gk are the total number of
transmission lines and conductance of kth line; the
The SVC is a shunt-connected static VAR voltages at the end buses of kth are Vi L and Vj L
generator/load whose output is adjusted to exchange
respectively.
capacitive or inductive current so as to maintain or
control a specific power system variable [9, 10].
B. Minimization of size of SVC
Typically, the power system control variable is the
In addition to the minimization of PL , the second term
terminal bus voltage. SVCs have two popular
F2 (SVC size) of objective function is for minimization
configurations. One configuration consists of a Fixed
of SVC size.
Capacitor (FC) and a Thyristor-Controlled Reactor
F2 (SVC size) = Rating of SVC in p.u. eq. 3
(TCR) and the other consists of a Thyristor-Switched
Capacitor (TSC) and TCR. In the limit of minimum or
C. Objective function
maximum susceptance, the SVC behaves like a fixed
The objective function for the optimization problem
capacitor or an inductor units.
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 Optimal Placement of SVC to Minimize Loss and Improve Voltage Profile under Power System Contingency using GA
can be obtained by combining all the two objectives
mentioned above as:
fF(u,v) = F1(u,v) + F2 ( SVC size )
eq.4
Now, the optimization can be carried out by
minimizing the objective function f F (u, v), subject to
various equality and inequality constraints.
1) Equality Constraints:
The equality constraints represent the typical load
flow equations as follows:
Where, NB represents total number of buses. PGi and
QGi are the generator real and reactive powers at bus i
and j; PDi and QDi are the active and reactive power
load at bus i and j; Gij and Bij are the transfer
conductance and susceptance of the line between bus i
and bus j, respectively.
2) Inequality Constraints:
Inequality constraints are the upper and lower limits
of reactive power of a generator. The reactive power of
ith generator must lie within its minimum (Qgimin ) and
maximum (Qgimax) limits. Mathematically, this can be
written as:
Qgimin ≤ Qgi ≤ Qgimax ; i = 1,2,3……. NG eq.7
IV. GENETIC ALGORITHM
The optimal locations of the FACTS devices can be
identified using the genetic algorithm (GA) search
technique. A brief overview GA is presented below:
A. Overview of Genetic Algorithm
Genetic algorithm is a global search and optimization
technique which is based on the mechanisms of
natural selection and genetics. It can search several
possible solutions simultaneously and do not require
any prior knowledge of the objective function. It
produces good quality solutions because it is
independent of the choice of the initial parameters.
Genetic algorithm is initiated with random creation of
initial population which represents possible solutions
of the optimization problem. Then the fitness of each
individual is evaluated by the value of the objective
function, which is called as fitness function. The new
population is formed by selecting the more fit
individuals using genetic operators (selection,
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crossover and mutation) until the assigned maximum
number of generations are reached or some form of
convergence criterion has been met. Finally, the
population stabilizes and most of the individuals in the
population are found to be almost identical.
B. Implementation of GA
1) Initialization
Each individual in the population represents a
candidate solution. A problem that involves more than
one decision variables, each variable is represented by
a string. In this work an individual is represented with
three strings, where, the first string of the individual is
related to the locations of the devices, second string
corresponds to the types of the devices, and the last
string represents the values of the devices.
In this paper, the formulation of SVC is described with
some parameters including the location and size of the
devices. Each individual is represented by a string that
depends upon SVC parameter which is used for
optimization. The fIrst value of every string displays
the location of SVC. It comprises the number of load
buses where SVC may be placed. The rest of the values
in the string indicate the possible sizing of device.
Initial population is produced from the number of
possible locations (i.e. load buses) for SVC placement
NB, NR i.e. the number of possible sizing for device
and Nind i.e. the number of individuals in the
population. An individual can be generated as follows:
at first a set of NB value according to number of load
buses in system is randomly chosen and inserted at the
fIrst location of each string. Thereafter, a set of NR
representing the size of the SVC are randomly chosen.
The whole initial population will be acquired when the
mentioned procedure is repeated for Nind times. The
objective function is calculated for each individual.
Thus, the new generation will be produced by the
outcome that have already achieved by the old
generation.
2) Selection strategy
Selection is a process in which individuals are coped
according to their fitness function which is similar to
that of natural selection found in biological systems.
Poorer performing individuals are weeded out and
better performing have greater than average chance to
be copied in next generation. There are a number of
selection operators proposed in [12]. Among them,
roulette wheel selection and tournament selection are
most common. Roulette wheel selection is used in this
work.
3) Crossover operation
Crossover is a mixing operator that swaps information
from selected parents. Crossover can occur at a single
position (single point crossover), or at number of
 Optimal Placement of SVC to Minimize Loss and Improve Voltage Profile under Power System Contingency using GA
different positions (multiple point crossover). In this
work two point crossovers is used in which two
crossover sites are chosen at random and offspring are
produced by exchanging the information between the
selected crossover sites.
4) Mutation
Mutation acts as a background operator and is used to
hunt the unexplored search space by randomly
altering the bits at one or more positions of the chosen
string with a small mutation probability. It maintains
the genetic diversity by avoiding premature
convergence to local optimum. The probability of
mutation is selected as 0.01, i. e. one bit in every
hundred will be muted.
All the above mentioned operators are used to produce
the offspring. The objective function (4) is computed
for all of the offspring and some of the best individuals
out of them are selected to create new generation. This
process is used to compare the best value of objective
function and average fitness of new generation; the
earlier generation must be at the same level or higher.
The flowchart for GA is shown in Fig. 2.
Fig.2.Flowchart of GA Implementation
V. GENETIC ALGORITHM FOR OPTIMAL
LOCATION AND SIZE OF SVC
The computational steps used for execution of GA for
finding the optimal location and sizing of SVC are as
follows:
1. Run Newton Raphson (NR) power flow program
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107
to compute VPI using (1), for all possible single line
outages contingencies.
2. Using value of VPI rank all single line outages
contingencies in order of their severity.
3. Implement GA to search optimal location and
sizing of SVC for minimization of real power loss, and
sizing of SVC, starting from the most severe
contingency with the highest value of VPI using
following steps.
a) Read system data and set parameters of GA.
Population size = NL, the total number of load buses
in the test power system.
b) With the SVC at various locations, solve power
flow problem for each individuals.
c) Compute the fitness of objective function f (u, v)
using (4).
d) Solve the constrained optimization problem by
applying GA operators: selection, crossover and
mutation.
e) If number of generation (GEN) is less than the
maximum limit of generation (MAXGEN), repeat
steps b) -d), else stop.
4. Place SVC of computed rating at the location
obtained as from step 3 and analyzes voltage profile,
and real power losses.
5. Comparing all results of the voltage profile, and
real power loss and find out the best optimal size and
location for SVC placement.
VI. SIMULATIONS RESULTS
The Genetic Algorithm has been implemented to
search optimal location and sizing of SVC in IEEE 30
bus system [13]. The test is carried out for base load as
well as for contingency conditions. The objective of
the test is to find optimum locations and sizes of SVC
to improve voltage profile, and minimize real power
loss. For optimal placement of SVC, single line
outages are considered as contingencies in the test
power system and to evaluate the severity of a
contingency VPI is used. It has been observed that NR
load flow converges for only for 38 line outages out of
41 Iine outages. The objective function (4) is described
as a mixed continuous-discrete optimization problem.
The placement of SVC is considered as a discreet
decision variable. All the 24 PQ buses (load buses) are
considered as the possible optimal location for SVC
placement.
Matlab programming codes are developed for GA, and
Newton–Raphson load flow algorithm is modified to
incorporate FACTS devices. The results of simulation
studies are summarized below:
A. IEEE 30-Bus Test System
IEEE 30-bus test system [13] contains one slack bus, 5
PV buses, 24 PQ buses and 41 transmission lines.
Genetic algorithm technique is used to find the
 Optimal Placement of SVC to Minimize Loss and Improve Voltage Profile under Power System Contingency using GA

optimal size and location of FACTS devices. To obtain Maximum number of generations: 80
the optimal values of the variables the GA-based Mutation probability: 0.05
algorithm is implemented with different control Crossover probability: 0.9
settings. Elitism: 0.2

The optimal settings of the GA control parameters are The results of studies for contingency conditions and
given below: imposed SVC are presented below:
Population size: 30

TABLE .I.OPTIMAL LOCATION AND SIZE OF SVC

Line Optimal location of Optimal Size of Real Power Loss Real Power Loss after
Outage SVC SVC (p.u.) before SVC (p.u.) SVC (p.u.)

1 26 -0.3828125 0.476930429 0.40275982

2 25 -0.775390625 0.369891087 0.207844052
3 29 -0.521484375 0.372551243 0.174487431
4 29 -0.51953125 0.407902544 0.233994212
5 30 -0.45703125 0.362833 0.295178905
6 4 0.521484375 0.371170686 0.20045527
7 29 -0.4609375 0.401664933 0.183821805
8 25 -0.751953125 0.390939431 0.156817848
9 30 -0.380859375 0.398375118 0.180628745
10 4 0.33984375 0.40679214 0.183463218
11 4 0.40625 0.414140598 0.177686117
12 26 -0.388671875 0.41329093 0.150794296
13 4 0.421875 NaN 0.175028611
14 25 -0.935546875 0.406074913 0.171320404
15 26 -0.439453125 0.411375466 0.181141919
16 4 0.41796875 NaN 0.174632159
17 25 -0.896484375 0.412266381 0.143461165
18 15 -0.9453125 0.408333025 0.153260051
19 26 -0.509765625 0.413635849 0.15701109
20 14 -0.849609375 0.41414858 0.148802436
21 16 -0.96875 0.414451497 0.14306759
22 4 0.359375 0.413499495 0.176047985
23 29 -0.466796875 0.414269635 0.173277777
24 4 0.37109375 0.410183061 0.177359882
25 18 -0.8046875 0.407826684 0.142318765
26 30 -0.5234375 0.409747231 0.158101619
27 29 -0.4609375 0.408321708 0.164681755
28 26 -0.353515625 0.412843043 0.16313272
29 30 -0.4609375 0.414121158 0.174368672
30 4 0.359375 0.413125506 0.176018323
31 4 0.3125 0.41187064 0.175857402
32 26 -0.37109375 0.414261728 0.15060287
33 30 -0.3671875 0.413974568 0.166154148
34 26 0.05859375 NaN Nan
35 29 -0.380859375 0.412220349 0.170233395
36 30 -0.19140625 0.388228863 0.155539076
37 29 -0.203125 0.410432124 0.162745401
38 30 -0.40625 0.409390396 0.166600052
39 30 -0.55859375 0.413079312 0.160384319
40 26 -0.5078125 0.369817448 0.160629925
41 30 -0.470703125 0.276907142 0.152238196

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Table I. provides the summary of results obtained for
optimal size, location of SVC and real power loss with
respect to a particular line outage.
VPI is employed to evaluate the severity of the
contingencies associated with the single line outages.
During power system testing, these single line outages
TABLE. II. CONTINGENCY RANKING WITHOUT SVC
Line
36 37
Outage
VPI 0.6118 0.0074
In this paper, it is evident from VPI that at some buses
the voltage magnitude has violated its permissible
limit for some of the single line outage contingencies.
Contingency ranking of lines is done from Table II.
Based on Voltage Performance Index of each outage
and the selected lines are 36, 37, 38, 25, 5 have been
considered for SVC placement.
1) Outage of line no. 36
Fig.3. Voltage profile for outage of line no. 36 without and with
SVC at bus no. 30.
The highest value of VPI is obtained for outage of line
no.36. Therefore outage of line 36 is found to be most
critical line outage. GA was implemented for outage
of line 36. Optimal location of SVC was found on bus
no.30 with -0.19140625 p.u. rating and power loss of
0.155539076 p.u. loss. It was observed from fig. 3 that
with line outage 36, the voltage magnitude at bus no
25,26,27,29,30 drop below .95 p.u. after the
placement of SVC at bus no 30 a significant
improvement in voltages at buses is observed.
2) Outage of line no. 37
Fig.4. Voltage profile for outage of line no.37 without and with
SVC at bus no.29.
The VPI is .0074 Second most severe contingency is
outage of line no.37. GA was implemented for outage
of line 37. Optimal location of SVC was found on bus
no.29 with rating -0.203125 p.u. and power loss of
0.162745401 p.u. loss. It was observed from fig. 4 that
with line outage 37, the voltage magnitude at bus no.
Proceedings of 5th SARC-IRF International Conference, 25th May-2014, New Delhi, India, ISBN: 978-93-84209-21-6
are regarded as contingencies while pursuing an
optimal placement of SVC. It has been observed that
NR load flow converges only for 38 line outages out of
41 line outages. For SVC placement, all the 24 PQ
buses (load buses) are considered to be a possible
optimal location.
38 25 5 15
0.006 0.0045 0.0017 0.0007
29, 30 drop below .95 p.u. after the placement of SVC
at bus no 29 a significant improvement in voltages at
buses is observed.
3) Outage of line no. 38
Fig.5. Voltage profile for outage of line no. 38 without and with
SVC at bus no. 26
Outage of line no.38 having VPI value as 0.006. The
optimal location for SVC was found to be bus no. 26
with rating of -0.40625 p.u. and power loss of
0.166600052p.u. Fig.5.Shows the voltage profile for
outage of line no.38 with or without SVC. After the
placement of SVC at bus no. 26 a significant
improvement in voltage at buses is observed.
4) Outage of line no. 25
Fig. 6. Voltage profile for outage of line no. 25 without and with
SVC at bus no. 18.
Fig.7. Shows power loss of the system for various line
outages with and without SVC. Since SVC does
dynamic reactive power compensation line flow in the
system reduces and hence power loss reduction is
observed. In most cases power loss reduction is upto
50% of base case loss during particular line outage.
109
 Optimal Placement of SVC to Minimize Loss and Improve Voltage Profile under Power System Contingency using GA
Fig.7. power loss for contingency with and without SVC.
CONCLUSION
In this paper, Optimal location and size of SVC is
searched, by using Genetic Algorithm, for voltage
profile improvement and minimising active power
loss. The voltage profile of the system is also analysed.
It is concluded that after adding SVC at optimal
locations voltage profile can be maintained in a power
system. The simulation is performed on IEEE 30 bus
system and optimal location and sizing of SVC is
calculated by using proposed method. This method
can be used for practical power system also.
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