Announcing the Final Examination of Shahrzad Mahdavi for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy
The penetration of renewable and distributed generation sources (DGs) in power distributio the overvoltage issues that demand appropriate voltage con systems has been increasing at an ever-faster rate. While DGs provide clean and affordable energy, their addition introduces new problems in the system operation. One of the main challenges due to the high penetration of DGs isntrol. This control is essential to maintain the power quality, energy efficiency, and voltage stability in the system. Voltage Regulators (VRs) and capacitor banks (CBs) are traditional control devices that are installed in the system to keep the desired voltage profile. However, they are not designed to operate in a way that can address the high frequency and magnitude changes occurring in systems with high penetration of DGs. Therefore, they need to be supplemented with voltage control performed by controlling the reactive power generation of the DGs. The coordination among these different control devices is essential for proper system operation. This thesis explores the design of the coordinated control of VRs, CBs, and DGs, by considering different control methods such as coordinated cooperative, predictive cooperative, and unified control of all voltage control devices. The proposed methods are implemented in a system with high penetration of DGs and tested by exploring the worst-case scenario in terms of DG sizing and placement. This scenario is determined analytically using sensitivities and verified using stochastic Monte Carlo simulation. The future generation of active power distribution systems need to be optimally controlled in order to be efficient, reliable, and resilient, while capable of effectively managing high penetration levels of DGs, and other controllable loads and devices. The important outcome of this thesis is the introduction of a practical voltage control method to achieve these goals.
Committee in Charge:
Aleksandar Dimitrovski, Chair, Electrical Engineering and Computer Science
Azadeh Vosoughi, University of Central Florida
Wei Sun, University of Central Florida
Qifeng Li, University of Central Florida
Zhaomiao Guo, University of Central Florida