Reactive Power Compensatioin Device Design with Utilization of an Integrated Circuit Controller

Abstract

Reactive power compensation is necessary to increase the efficiency of current and future global electrical infrastructure. There are many methods for the design and implementation of reactive power compensators. This thesis will focus on the design, implementation, and study of a reactive power compensation device utilizing an integrated circuit controller, gating circuits, and dynamically switched shunt capacitor banks with special attention being given to the integrated circuit controller, gating circuit, and its switching scheme. The compensation device controller will be constructed of discrete integrated circuit chips with a primary focus on the use of an analog-to-digital converter for data capture and a microcontroller for data manipulation. The goal of the controller is to capture and process reactive power data and then select and send the appropriate switching signals to capacitor banks which will dynamically adjust the reactive power levels on a three phase system. Transient free switching of the shunt capacitor banks will be performed by IGBTs that are controlled by a proposed gating circuit. In this work, the reactive power compensation device with integrated circuit controller is discussed, implemented, and analyzed. It is concluded that the designed reactive power compensator performs as expected and correctly compensates reactive power demand from a three phase load, thus decreasing the reactive power demand seen by the electrical grid.