Thyristor-Controlled Series Capacitor (TCSC)

TCSC controllers use thyristor-controlled reactor (TCR) in parallel with capacitor segments of series capacitor bank. The combination of TCR and capacitor allow the capacitive reactance to be smoothly controlled over a wide range and switched upon command to a condition where the bi-directional thyristor pairs conduct continuously and insert an inductive reactance into the line.

Fig .1 Circuit of TCSC TCSC is an effective and economical means of solving problems of transient stability, dynamic stability, steady state stability and voltage stability in long transmission lines. TCSC, the first generation of FACTS, can control the line impedance through the introduction of a thyristor controlled capacitor in series with the transmission line. A TCSC is a series controlled capacitive reactance that can provide continuous control of power on the ac line over a wide range.

Practical TCSC circuit

Practical TCSC circuit has various protection elements including MOV, circuit breaker in series with an inductor. TCSC module with different protective elements is as shown below.

Fig. 2 Practical circuit of TCSC

TCSC Basically, comprises of a series capacitor, in parallel with a Thyristor Controlled Reactor (TCR), Ls. a Metal Oxide Varistor (MOV), essentially a nonlinear resistor, is connected across the series capacitor to prevent the occurrence of high capacitor over voltages. Not only does the MOV limit the voltage across the capacitor, but it allows the capacitor to remain in the circuit even during fault conditions and helps improve the transient stability. a circuit breaker is also installed across the TCSC module to bypass it if a severe fault or equipment malfunction occurs. A current limiting inductor, Ld is incorporated in the circuit to restrict both the magnitude and the frequency of the capacitor current during the capacitor bypass operation.

Modes of operation of TCSC

There are three modes of operation of TCSC depending upon the firing angle of the pulses fed to the thyristor. Thyristor blocked mode Thyristor by passed mode Vernier operating mode

Thyristor blocked Operating Mode: When the thyristor valve is not triggered and
the thyristors are kept in non conducting state, the TCSC is operating in blocking mode. In this mode, the TCSC performs like a fixed series capacitor.

Thyristor bypass Operating mode: In bypass mode the thyristor valve is triggered
continuously and the valve stays conducting all the time; so the TCSC behaves like a parallel connection of the series capacitor with the inductor, Ls in the thyristor valve branch. In this mode, the resulting voltage in the steady state across the TCSC is inductive and the valve current is somewhat bigger than the line current due to the current generation in the capacitor bank.

Vernier Operating Mode: In Vernier control the TCSC dynamics are varied
continuously by controlling the firing angle. The firing angle is possible from 0o to 90o for each half cycle when it is generated from the zero crossing of the line current .

Operating Regions Of TCSC

TCSC module has series capacitor shunted by a thyristor controlled reactor as shown in figure 3. Usually to obtain a desired voltage more than one TCSC is installed in line. The element controlled by TCSC is the impedance of the line. The varying firing angle of thyristor controlled reactor is used to control impedance of TCSC. As shown in the figure above the impedance of TCSC acts like a function of firing angle. According to this diagram we have three regions: 1. Capacitive region 2. Inductive region 3. Resonance region

Fig.3 characteristics of TCSC If we want to decrease the power transfer from sending bus bar to receiving bus bar we have to operate TCSC in inductive region. In such scenario the length of transmission line enlarged. In such mode the TCSC is rarely operated. If we want to decrease the electric length of transmission line that is we want to amplify power transfer from sending bus bar to receiving bus bar, TCSC should be operated in capacitive region. Due to stability issues TCSC is not operated in Resonance region.

TCSC equivalent reactance

The expression for TCSC equivalent reactance, as a function of the TCSC firing angle is given by:

( ( ( ) ) (

) ( | )[ ) ( | ) ( )]

So from the equation it is clear that we can control the reactance of the TCSC by controlling the conduction angle and again since the conduction angle is related with the firing angle we can conclude that the TCSC reactance XTCSC can be controlled by controlling the firing angle. Since the relationship between and the equivalent fundamental frequency reactance offered by TCSC,XTCSC () is a unique-valued function, the TCSC is modelled here as a variable capacitive reactance within the operating region defined by the limits imposed by . Thus, XTCSCmin XTCSC XTCSCmax, with XTCSCmax = XTCSC (min) and XTCSCmin = XTCSC (180) = C. In this study, the controller is assumed to operate only in the capacitive region, i.e.,min > where corresponds to the resonant point, as the inductive region associated with 90 < < induces high harmonics that cannot be properly modelled in stability studies.

MODELLING OF THE POWER SYSTEM WITH TCSC

Fig.4 SMIB power system connected with TCSC

Here the synchronous generator is delivering power to an infinite bus through a double circuit transmission line, a transformer and the TCSC. Here XT is the reactance of the transformer and Z=R+jXL is the impedance of the transmission line where XL represents the reactance of the transmission line. Here VT, Eb are the terminal voltage of the alternator and the infinite bus voltage respectively and XTH is the thevenin impedance of the receiving end system. Without the TCSC the reactance of the transmission line is X but after the connection of the TCSC the reactance becomes XEff = X-XTCSC i.e the reactance decreases if the TCSC operates in capacitive vernier mode and the power transfer will increase according to the formula.

So by controlling the TCSC reactance the overall reactance of the power system can be controlled and the power transfer can be controlled.

Structure of the TCSC Controller

The structure of TCSC-based damping controller, to modulate the reactance offered by the TCSC, XTCSC( ) is shown in Fig.5 . The input signal of the proposed controllers is the speed deviation (), and the output signal is the reactance offered by the TCSC, XTCSC ( ) .

Fig. 5 Structure of TCSC-based controller

The structure consists of a gain block with gain KT, a signal washout block and two-stage phase compensation blocks. The signal washout block serves as a highpass filter, with the time constant TWT, high enough to allow signals associated with oscillations in input signal to pass unchanged.

[11]. Preeti

Singh, Mrs.Lini Mathew, Prof.S.Chatterji, NITTTR, Chandigarh Matlab based Simulation of TCSC FACTS Controller 2ND National Conference on Challenges & Opportunities in Information Technology (COIT2008) - March 2008.

K.Vijayakumar and R.P.Kumudini Devi, Anna University, Tamilnadu ON A Hybrid Genetic Algorithm for Optimal Power Flow Incorporating FACTS devices Asian Journal of Scientific Research 1(4):403-411,2008 ISSN 1992:1454.
[13] K. R. Padiyar, Power System Dynamics Stability and Control, BS Publications, 2nd Edition, Hyderabad, India, 2002. [14] P. Kundur, Power System Stability and Control. New York: McGrawHill, 1994.