International Journal of Engineering and Technical Research (IJETR)

ISSN: 2321-0869, Volume-3, Issue-6, June 2015

Control Strategy for Fault Current Interruption in a

Radial Distribution Line using Dynamic Voltage
Restorer
M. Prasanthi, Dr. D. Vijaya Kumar

practiced and sensitive electronic equipment which results in

Abstract These days power quality is becoming increasingly voltage disturbances, the most common power quality
essential in industrial electricity consumers point of view. This problem. DVR is a series compensation device, which is
paper proposes a control strategy of DVR which interrupts fault introduced recently to protect sensitive electric load from
current in a radial distribution line using dynamic voltage
power quality problems such as voltage sags, swells,
restorer (DVR). Under the conditions of linear and non-linear
loads the DVR detects and compensates voltage sags effectively.
unbalance and distortion by means of power electronic
This control scheme can interrupt fault current within few controllers that use voltage source converters (VSC).
seconds. The magnitude and phase of measured voltages is Voltage sags is defined as a sudden reduction of
estimated using digital filters which adequately mitigates the supply voltage from 90% to 10%of nominal with a recovery in
impacts of harmonics, disturbances and noise on the phasor short period of time. It is examined as the most serious
parameters. The results of the simulation studies are performed problem of power quality that can occur at any time with
in the MATLAB SIMULINK software. For this control scheme, amplitude ranging from 10%-90% for a duration lasts for half
phase locked loop is not required so that for each phase, the a cycle to one minute. Voltage sags is caused either by starting
injected voltages of which magnitude and phase angle can be
of large induction motor or fault in power system which can
controlled independently. By using Matlab/Simulink software,
these simulation studies give results: 1) Under different fault
interrupt any electrical or electronic equipment that is load
conditions, the proposed control system performs satisfactorily. sensitive. There will be huge loss if the voltage sag is at
2) The point of common coupling voltage is also restored by customer load end.
using this control scheme of DVR.
On the other hand an increase in rms voltage or current at the
power frequency is defined as voltage swell with duration
Index Terms Dynamic voltage restorer (DVR), fault current ranges from 0.5 cycles to 1 min, typical magnitude is between
interrupting, voltage sag and voltage swell. 1.1 and 1.8 up and swells magnitude is greater than 1.0 in this
case.
I. INTRODUCTION

Custom power device (CPD) is a powerful tool to protect

sensitive loads if there is any disturbance from power line and
it is based on semiconductor switches concept. There are
many custom power devices; one such is Dynamic Voltage
Restorer (DVR) which is used to prevent voltage sags [1], [2].

To enhance voltage quality, three phase ac voltages are

injected in series with the supply voltage by DVR which also
adjusts the wave shape, phase angle and voltage magnitude.
The main components of a DVR are a series transformer, a
harmonic filter, a voltage- source converter (VSC), a dc-side Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of a DVR with a line-side harmonic
capacitor and an energy storage device [5], [6] ) as shown in filter.
Fig. 1. The line-side harmonic filter [4] comprises of the filter
capacitor and the leakage inductance of the series In distribution systems voltage swells are less common
transformer. compared to voltage sags, thus they are of not much
importance. Both voltage sag and swell can cause failure or
To increase energy efficiency and productivity, control shutdown of sensitive equipment such as found in
devices, sensitive power electronic equipments and semiconductor or chemical plants and a large current
non-linear loads are employed by modern industries as part of unbalance is created that could blow fuses or trip breakers.
automated processes. Industrial systems use large number of The effects ranging from minor quality variations to
production downtime and for the customer the equipment
M.Prasanthi, , Dept. Electrical and Electronics Engineering, AITAM, damage are very expensive.
Tekkali, India, Ph: 8179984969. Different methods were introduced to reduce voltage
Dr.D.Vijaya Kumar, Prof., Dept. Electrical and Electronics sags and swells but the most efficient method is the use of
Engineering, AITAM, Tekkali, India.

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Control Strategy for Fault Current Interruption in a Radial Distribution Line using Dynamic Voltage Restorer

custom power device i.e., DVR. Energizing a large capacitor device. The DVR provides a three phase independently
bank or Switching off a large inductive load causes swells. controlled voltage source utilizing power electronic
Dynamic Voltage Restorer with its operating components, whose voltage vector (magnitude and angle) is
principle is introduced in this paper and to compensate added to the source voltage to restore the load voltage to a
voltage sags/swell a simple control based on DQO method is prescribed level. The adopted DVR converter consists of
used. The simulation is done using MATLAB/SIMULINK. three independent H-bridge VSCs which are connected to a
The simulation results validate the effectiveness of the common dc-link capacitor. These VSCs are connected in
proposed control method of DVR. series with the supply grid through a single phase transformer.
In the proposed FCI control system there are three
independent and identical controllers for each single-phase
II. CONTROL STRATEGY FOR FCI VSC of the DVR. Let us assume the fundamental frequency
components supply voltage , load voltage , and the
In a distribution network load side voltage is regulated by the injected voltage , from Fig. 1 are
Dynamic Voltage Restorer (DVR) which is a series connected

Fig. 2. Per-phase block diagram of the DVR control system in FCI mode.

(1)
(2)
(3)

To measure the phase angles and magnitudes of the

phasors corresponding to and (i.e., and
, respectively in 5 ms [5], two identical least
error squares (LES) filters [9] are used. Per-phase block
diagram of the proposed DVR control system corresponding Fig. 3. Magnitude of the LES filters frequency response.
to the FCI operation mode is shown in Fig. 2, where Vn is the
nominal RMS phase voltage. The over current fault detection voltage. The following two subsections describes the DVR
method of [5] and [8] gives the recorded studies in this paper. outer voltage phasor control and inner instantaneous
When the absolute value of the instantaneous current exceeds voltage control corresponding to each phase.
double the rated load current then the fault detection
mechanism is activated for each phase. The proposed multi A. Voltage Phasor Control System
loop control system [3], [6], [10][12] includes an outer
control loop (voltage phasor control) and an inner control The injected voltage phasor which is required is equal to
loop (instantaneous voltage control). The DVR harmonic source voltage phasor in this FCI operation mode, but in
filter causes the transients for which the inner loop provides phase opposition [i.e., the injected phasor is
damping [11] and [13], and improves the dynamic response controlled to be ]. Hence in terms of transient
and stability of the DVR. The sag compensation and the FCI response, speed, and steady-state error, the performance of
functions share the inner loop. The injected voltage the voltage phasor control is improved by controlling voltage
magnitude and phase angle of the fault phase is controlled by magnitude and phase separately. And the feed forward signals
the outer loop when a downstream fault is detected, which are included to feedback control system [7], [8], [10] [13].
also reduces the load-side voltage to zero in order to interrupt From Fig. 2 we can observe that the two proportional-integral
the fault current and restore the PCC (PI) controllers ( and ) can be used for removing the
steady-state errors of the magnitude and phase of the injected

233 www.erpublication.org
 International Journal of Engineering and Technical Research (IJETR)
ISSN: 2321-0869, Volume-3, Issue-6, June 2015
voltage. Hence with zero steady state error the parameters of
each controller are regulated for attaining fast response.
So, the output of the phasor control system is a reference
phasor that can be represented as . So,
is regularized by to terminate the effects of the dc-link
voltage variations on the injected voltages. The magnitude
and the phase angle of are calculated separately. Then the
magnitude is passed through a limiter in voltage phasor
control (Fig. 2). The phasor magnitude and phase angle which
are ensued are converted to the sinusoidal signal. This is the
reference signal for the instantaneous voltage control.
Fig. 4. Single-line diagram of the system used for simulation
B. Instantaneous Voltage-Control System studies.

Under ideal conditions, if output of the phasor-based A. Three-Phase Downstream Fault

controller is fed instantaneously to the sinusoidal In Fig. 4 the Bus 3 of the system is subjected to a
pulse-width modulation (SPWM) unit a voltage sag can be three phase short circuit with a negligible fault resistance at
compensated successfully. However, even under these 0.15 sec prior to the fault initiation, the DVR is inactive or in
conditions the resonances of the harmonic filter cannot be standby mode. During the fault, if the DVR is bypassed, as
removed effectively. Hence, to enhance the stability and shown in Fig. 5 the voltage at Bus3 drops about 0.3 p.u. and
dynamic response of the DVR, an instantaneous injected the fault current increases to about 20 times the rated load
voltage controller and a harmonic filter capacitor current current.
controller are used for attenuating resonances.

The reference signal which is generated for the injected

voltage is then compared with the measured injected
voltage . Also the error which is obtained is fed to the
voltage controller. From Fig. 2, we observe that the output of
the voltage controller is the reference signal for the filter
capacitor current control loop and again it is compared with
the measured capacitor current . Then the error is fed to
the current controller. From the proposed control system, the Fig. 5. (a) Voltages at Bus 3. (b) Fault currents, during
steady-state error is completely eliminated in the outer control downstream three phase fault when the DVR is inactive.
loop (say and ) by means of PI controllers. Through this
the dc signals (magnitude and phase angle) are tracked. Using the proposed controller for DVR the same
Consequently, in the inner control loop the higher order system shown in Fig. 4 is simulated. Fig. 6(a)(b), shows the
controllers are not required as these are designed depending restored three-phase supply-side voltages, and the three-phase
on sinusoidal references. Thus, from Fig. 2, we can see that load side voltages respectively. Load voltage is reduced to
zero to interrupt the fault currents. The source voltage is
and are pure gains and respectively. The when
restored and Fig. 6(c) illustrates that the proposed FCI method
large cause the DVR filter resonance which can be amplified
limits and interrupts the maximum three-phase fault current
so that the stability of the system is affected skeptically [12].
effectively within short interval of time.
Hence, by a feed forward loop the transient response of the
DVR is improved and the voltage controller is used as a small
proportional gain. When the is large, harmonic filter
resonance is damped by it more effectively, which is limited
by practical considerations (e.g., amplification of capacitor
current noise, measurement noise, and dc offset [8]). So, the
proportional gain has lowest value which damps the
resonances and it is used effectively. Hence, the feed forward
voltage is added to current controller output for derivation of
the signal for PWM generator.

III. STUDY RESULTS

Fig 4 shows a single-line diagram of a power system for which
the performance of the proposed DVR control system is
judged under different fault conditions using MATLAB/
SIMULINK software environment. In this control system,
525-kVA DVR system is installed on the 0.4-kV feeder, for
protecting a 500-kVA, 0.90 lagging power factor load against
voltage sags. Here, the base voltage for per-unit values is the Fig. 6. (a) Source voltages. (b) Load voltages. (c) Line
nominal phase voltage. currents during the three-phase downstream fault

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Control Strategy for Fault Current Interruption in a Radial Distribution Line using Dynamic Voltage Restorer

B. Line-to-line Downstream Faults

The system of Fig. 4 is subjected to a phase-A to phase-B fault
with a fault resistance of 0.001.Fault is initiated at 0.15 sec.
When the DVR is inactive or bypassed during the fault, as
shown in Fig. 7 the PCC voltage drops to 0.6 p.u and also the
fault current increases to about 13 times the rated load current.
That is high fault current flow through the system.

Fig. 9. (a) Voltages at Bus 3 (b) Fault currents, during the

downstream single phase- to-ground fault when the DVR is
inactive.

Fig. 10 (a)(c), respectively, shows the restored supply-side

voltage for the faulty phase, the load-side voltage and the
interrupted fault current. Load side voltage for faulty phase
are reduced to zero to interrupt the fault currents and the line
currents while the healthy phase remains the same in
magnitude. FCI control successfully interrupts the faulty
current and restores the voltage of the faulty phases within
Fig. 7. (a) Voltages at Bus 3(b) Fault currents, during less time. It also shows that only the faulty phase, phase C of
downstream phase-to phase fault when the DVR is inactive the DVR is affected, and the healthy phases are not
Fig. 8 (a)(b), respectively, shows the restored supply-side interrupted.
voltages, and the load-side voltages. Supply side voltage is
restored and load side voltage is reduced to zero to interrupt
the fault currents and the line currents. FCI control
successfully interrupts the fault current and restores the
source voltage of the faulty phases within less time. It also
shows that only the two faulty phases of the DVR is affected,
and the healthy phase is not interrupted.

Fig. 10. (a) Source voltages. (b) Load voltages. (c) Line
currents. during the single-phase-to-ground downstream fault.

IV. SIMULATION RESULTS

Fig. 8. (a) Source voltages. (b) Load voltages. (c) Line

currents during the line-line downstream fault

C. Line-to-Ground Downstream Fault

Phase-C of the system shown in Fig. 4 is subjected to a fault

with a negligible resistance of 0.001and the fault is initiated at
0.15 s. If the DVR is inactive, as the result shown in Fig.9, the
voltage at PCC considerably drops to about 0.2 pu and the
fault current increases 16 times rated current for the faulty
phase C.
Fig. 1 Supply voltages

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 International Journal of Engineering and Technical Research (IJETR)
ISSN: 2321-0869, Volume-3, Issue-6, June 2015

Fig. 6: Instantaneous load voltage error

Fig. 2: Estimated supply voltage magnitude vs of depressed
phases

Fig. 3: Injected voltage magnitude for the depressed phases Fig. 7: Negative sequence components of the grid side
voltages

Fig. 4: Injected voltage for depressed phases Fig. 8: DC link voltage

V. CONCLUSION
This paper proposes a novel control strategy for independent
control of the injected voltages in each phase of the DVR to
interrupt downstream fault currents in a radial distribution
feeder. The proposed control strategy effectively
compensates the load voltage zero- and negative-sequence
components, as well as the positive-sequence component.
This enables the DVR to restore the load voltages during
balanced and unbalanced sags, in a short time interval (5 ms),
with zero steady-state error. This control function is an
addition to the voltage-sag compensation control of the DVR.
The performance of the proposed controller can be observed
using different fault scenarios, in which arcing fault
conditions are included. The simulation studies demonstrate
Fig. 5: Restored load voltage that the proposed multiloop control system comprises of an

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Control Strategy for Fault Current Interruption in a Radial Distribution Line using Dynamic Voltage Restorer

outer control loop (voltage phasor control) and an inner

control loop (instantaneous voltage control). The damping is
provided by inner loop for which the transients are caused by
the DVR harmonic filter. Hence, the dynamic response and
stability of the DVR can be improved efficiently. The inner Ms. M. Prasanthi received the B.Tech Degree in
loop is shared by the sag compensation and the FCI functions. Electrical & Electronics Engineering from Aditya Institute of Technology &
When a downstream fault is detected, the injected voltage Management, Tekkali, Srikakulam, India in 2012. Currently persuing
M.Tech in Aditya Institute of Technology and Management, Tekkali
magnitude and phase angle is controlled by outer loop of the Srikakulam, India. Her research interests include power quality and power
faulty phase(s). Thus the load-side voltage is reduced to zero. electronics.
This interrupts the fault current and the PCC voltage is
restored. This proposed control system also performs
satisfactorily under downstream arcing fault conditions.

REFERENCES
Dr. D.Vijaya Kumar completed his graduation in
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