ISSN: 1999-1630

SEU Journal of Science and Engineering, Vol. 10, No. 2, December 2016

Load Frequency Control in Power System

Md. Al-Amin Sarker and A K M Kamrul Hasan*
Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Southeast University, Dhaka, Bangladesh.
Abstract
This research presents decentralized control scheme for Load Frequency Control in a multi-area Power System
by appreciating the performance of the methods in a single area power system. A number of modern control
techniques are adopted to implement a reliable stabilizing controller. An attempt has been undertaken aiming
at investigating the load frequency control problem in a power system consisting of two power generation unit
and the dynamic performance of Load Frequency Control (LFC) in three-area interconnected hydrothermal
reheat power system by the use of Artificial Intelligent. In this propose scheme, control methodology
developed using conventional controller, for three-area interconnected hydro-thermal reheat power system.
In this research, area-1 and area-2 consists of thermal reheat power plant whereas area-3 consists of hydro
power plant. Further in this scheme, the combination of most complicated system like hydro plant and
thermal plant with reheat turbine are interconnected. The performances of the controllers are simulated using
MATLAB/SIMULINK package. The robustness and reliability of the various control schemes is examined
through simulations.

Keywords: Load Frequency Control (LFC), Area Control Error (ACE), Multiple generators, Load control in
interconnected systems, Tie-line power, Automatic Generation Control (AGC).

I. Introduction 2013). The combination of active power and frequency

In an electric power system, Load Frequency control is generally known as Load Frequency Control
Control (LFC) is a system to maintain reasonably (Load Frequency Control (LFC), 2013). Modern day
uniform frequency, to divide the load between the power systems are divided into various areas. For
generators and to control the tie-line interchange example in Bangladesh, there are many plants, e.g.,
schedules. Load Frequency Control badly needed for Ashugonj Power Plant, Bheramara Power Plant etc.
power system because if the normal frequency is 50 Each of these areas is generally interconnected to its
Hertz and the system frequency falls below 47.5 Hertz neighboring areas. The transmission lines that connect
or goes up above 52.5 Hertz then the blades of the an area to its neighboring area are called tie-lines.
turbine are likely to get damaged so as to prevent the Power sharing between two areas occurs through these
stalling of the generator. Here given some model that tie-lines. Load frequency control, as the name signifies
how to control load frequency in power system. Two regulates the power flow between different areas while
main variables that change during transient power load holding the frequency constant.
are- area frequency and tie line power inter change
The remainder of this paper is organized as follows:
(Load Frequency Control (LFC), 2013). The concept of
Section II presents, the Problem Formulation in contrast
Load Frequency Control (LFC) is directly related to the
with single and multi-area. In Section III presents,
aforementioned variables since the task is to minimize
illustrate the technical performance of proposed AGC
this variation (Load Frequency Control (LFC), 2013).
scheme through computer simulations on single and
The key thing is to maintain the steady state at null
multi-area interconnected test system. Finally in
position. In this vein, effective measures like Active
Section IV presents, discussions and the conclusions
Disturbance Rejection Control (ADRC) have been
with future work
developed that allow practical control (Load Frequency
Control (LFC), 2013). The main bifurcation between
frequency and voltage in power system is on the II. Problem Formulation
account of active and reactive power. The dependency If a change in load is taken care by two generating
of frequency is on active power whereas that of voltage is stations running parallel then the complex nature of the
on the reactive power(Load Frequency Control (LFC), system increases. The ways of sharing the load by two
* Corresponding Author: A K M Kamrul Hasan, Lecturer, Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Southeast University,
251/A & 252 Tejgaon, Dhaka, Bangladesh. Email: [email protected]
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SEU Journal of Science and Engineering, Vol. 10, No. 2, December 2016

machines are as follow; two generating stations that are Previous in this system have some problems such
connected to each other by tie line. If the change in load as disturbance, fluctuation and LFC is not sufficient
is either at A or at B and the generation of A is regulated enough but in this model most of problems are solved.
so as to have constant frequency then this kind of
regulation is called as Flat Frequency Regulation. The B. Two area power systems
other way of sharing the load is that both A and B would The Load Frequency Control (LFC) problem for
regulate their generations to maintain the frequency two area power systems is presented in (Singh et al.
constant. This is called parallel frequency regulation. 2012). Due to non-linearity in the connected load
The third possibility is that the change in the frequency and governor dead bands, the actual system response
of a particular area is taken care of by the generator of characteristic is non- linear. Therefore, a linear tie-line
that area thereby maintain the tie-line loading. This bias characteristic does not match the actual system
method is known as flat tie-line loading control. In response characteristic (Fosha C et al. 1970). This
Selective Frequency control each system in a group is mismatch causes unnecessary fuel consumption and
taken care of the load changes on its own system and increased wear and tear on generators. The LFC of two-
does not help the other systems, the group for changes area hydro–hydro-power system with Proportional
outside its own limits. In Tie-line Load-bias control, Integral Derivative (PID) controller based on maximum
all the power systems in the interconnection aid in peak resonance specification that is graphically
regulating frequency regardless of where the frequency supported by the Nichols chart is discussed in (Sudha
changes originates. KR et al. 2012). The automatic generation of three types
A. Single area power systems of interconnected two-area multi-unit all-hydropower
system, all-thermal and thermal-hydro mixed have
The Load Frequency Control (LFC) problem been investigated in (K Khshian et al. 2010). There
for single area thermal power systems is including heat thermal power system with governor dead zone is
Generation Rate Constraint (GRC) is presented in (A discussed in (Bahtti P 2010), while reheat thermal power
P Battebury et al. 1974). The LFC scheme of one-area system with GRC is presented in (T. Sou, 2011). The
thermal system with single time delay is presented LFC of two-area thermal–thermal power system with
in (Pan CT et al. 1989). The LFC with multi-source time delay is considered in (Shuda KR, 2012). The two-
(Thermal–Hydro) as single area is proposed in (Wang area interconnected thermal reheat power system with
Y et al. 1994). The LFC problem for single area hydro- Inter- line Power Flow Controller (IPFC) and Redox
power system is presented in (Jiang en L et al. 2012). Flow Batteries (RFB) units for LFC is proposed in (IA
The transient speed response of a single, isolated, Chidambaram et al 2012). The two-area power system
governed hydro-generator operating at, or near full consisting of identical reheat turbines interconnected
load is discussed in. The automatic generation control via AC link and AC/DC links are presented for LFC in
of hydro- plant is presented in (Jiang en L et al. 2012). (Ibraheem et al. 2012).
The LFC of an isolated small- hydro-power system with
reduced dump load is described in (TS, 2006). This
power plant for LFC design consists of governor G_g(s)
non-reheated turbine G_t(s), load and machine G_p(s),
and 1/R is the droop characteristics, a kind of feedback
gain to improve the damping properties of the power
system. The dynamics of these subsystems are-

Figure 1: Two-area with Tie-Line Connection.

The whole system model can be illustrated by, The control objective is now to regulate the
frequency of each area and to simultaneously regulate
the tie-line power as per inter-area power contracts.
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SEU Journal of Science and Engineering, Vol. 10, No. 2, December 2016

et al. 2012). The LFC for three-area power system with

different turbine units, such as non-reheat, reheat and
hydraulic is considered in (Dong L et al. 2012).The
transfer of power between two areas is done through
tie lines.

In two-area power system, in order that the steady

state tie line power error be made zero, another integral
control loop must be introduced to integrate the
incremental tie-line power signal and feed it back to the
speed changer. This is accomplished by defining ACE
as a linear combination of incremental frequency and
tie-line power.

Thus, for control area 1,

Figure 2: Three-Area inters Connection.

There are some problems such as disturbance, The Transfer Functions of different blocks used in
accuracy shortage and LFC is not sufficient enough but power system model are given below:
in this model most of problems are solved.
Transfer function (T/F) of hydraulic Turbine is,
C. Three area power systems
The Load Frequency Control (LFC) challenges in
three area power systems are presented in (Milan, 1972).
Those three-area are interconnected (D Rerkpreedapong
et al. 2003) consists one steam plus one hydro unit,
which forms area 1, while one steam plus one hydro
unit of area 2 and area 3 with one steam. The thermal
power system interconnected as three areas is presented
in (SP, 2003). The three interconnected areas that
consist of two thermal and one hydro unit in each area
is considered in (SP, 2005). Three thermal generating
units in each area of three-area interconnected power
system are considered in (H Bevrani et al. 2009). Two
different interconnections (a) Radial type and (b) Ring
type with thermal unit in three area power systems
have been considered in (F Daneshfar et al. 2010). The Previous in this system have some problems such
LFC problem for three-area thermal power system as accuracy shortage, disturbance, fluctuation and
with communication delays is discussed in (W. Jiang LFC is not sufficient enough but in this model most of
L et al. 2012). In order to consider AGC, the area-1is problems are solved.
modeled by two generators while the other two areas
have single generator equivalents of four and three III. Simulation Results
generators in area-2 and area-3, respectively (X.Alrifai A. Uncontrolled Single-Area
MT et al. 2011). The LFC for three area power system
with time delays has been also discussed in (J Uang CF In an uncontrolled single area power system has
et al. 2006). The load frequency controller for a three governor, turbine and inertia load. By changing of value
area thermal power system is proposed in (F Daneshfar its output looks much better than others and reliable.
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SEU Journal of Science and Engineering, Vol. 10, No. 2, December 2016

Figure 3: MATLAB Model of an uncontrolled single area

power system.

From Fig 4, showing the disturbance Y-axis change

of frequency looks stable at point 0-1s with respect to
Figure 4: Output of an uncontrolled single area power
time of X-axis at time 1s it decreasing with respect to system.
time. Afterwards disturbance at point -0.065dB and
time scale 1.9s it increasing and oscillating. a generator with a tie-line but in this scheme applied
two generator parallel in thermal area but another area
B. Thermal and Hydro Power Plant of hydro there has been used a generator and a tie-line
part that’s why this scheme is much better than others
There have a thermal area where the main technique (Fig-5). By using of two generators in thermal area, the
has been applied in generator side where need to have output result looks much more reliable.

Figure 5: MATLAB Model of two-area Hydro-thermal reheats power system.

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SEU Journal of Science and Engineering, Vol. 10, No. 2, December 2016

(a) (c)

(b) (d)
Figure 6: Output of two area hydro-thermal reheats power system.

C. TWO THERMAL AND A HYDRO POWER

In Fig 6, there have scopes (a), (b), (c), (d) at time PLANT
0-1s change of frequency looks stable then the frequency
There have three areas where the main technique
in scope (a) and (b) start to
has been applied in two thermal areas showing that
in Fig7. In two thermal area has been used saturation,
integrator parts and generator side of second thermal
decreasing from 1-1.5s then increasing with respect area has been used two generator in parallel but another
to time oscillate and change of frequency fluctuating on thermal area and hydro area side have a generator and
the other hand in scope (c) and (d) change of frequency tie-line parallel that’s why this scheme is much better
increasing 1-1.5s then decreasing with respect to time than others. By using of saturation, integrator and two
oscillate and change of frequency fluctuating. generators in parallel in second thermal area, the output
result looks much more reliable.
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SEU Journal of Science and Engineering, Vol. 10, No. 2, December 2016

Figure 7: MATLAB Model of three-area Hydro-thermal reheats power system.

(a) (b)
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SEU Journal of Science and Engineering, Vol. 10, No. 2, December 2016

(c) (d)
Figure 8: Output of three-area hydro-thermal reheats power system.
In Fig 8, there have scopes (a), (b), (c), (d) time 0-5.5s References
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frequency-control-lfc.html
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