2012 International Conference and Exposition on Electrical and Power Engineering (EPE 2012), 25-27 October, Iasi, Romania

A Control Method for SVPWM-based STATCOM

Using Active-reactive Current Decouple under dq
Coordinate System
Huang Zhichao, Yang Shengzhen, Yan Hongyan, Fan Xingming
Department of Electrical Engineering
Guilin University of Electronic Technology
Guilin, China
hzc8021@126.com, yangshengzhen1986@163.com

AbstractA control method for SVPWM-based static

synchronous compensator (STATCOM) using active-reactive
current decouple under dq coordinate system is proposed.
STATCOM with active-reactive current decouple based on dq
coordinate system can precisely and quickly follow the reference
current. It can lower switching frequency, enhance DC voltage
utilization by proposing SVPWM. A simulation model based on
this method is built in the Matlab platform. The simulation
results show that, the proposed control method can make sure
STATCOM precisely and quickly compensate reactive power,
improve the power factor, stabilize the DC voltage. It has
excellent dynamic and steady-state characteristics.

According to the characteristics of reactive power

compensation system, a control algorithm for low power
rating STATCOM is proposed, which decouples activereactive current under dq coordinate system, and then uses
voltage SVPWM to generate PWM signals for inverter.
Decoupling the active and reactive current under dq coordinate
system can ensure real-timely tracking active-reactive current.
It is efficaciously able to lower switching frequency by
SVPWM technology. In addition, it can enhance the
utilization of DC voltage, and reduce the harmonic
components of output.
II.

Keywords-reactive power compensation; dq coordinate system;

active-reactive current decouple; SVPWM; STATCOM

I.

INTRODUCTION

STATCOM, as one of the most important part of shunttyped Flexible AC Transmission System (FACTS) family, can
continuously regulate the output reactive power between
capacitive and inductive. Through properly injecting reactive
power into the power grid, it is able to stabilize the running
voltage of power system, restrain voltage flicker, enhance
power factor, and improve power quality. Whats more, it can
enhance the capacity of existing transmission network, reduce
the transmission network loss [1-2]. With many merits and
good dynamic-static performance, STATCOM has become the
important development direction of reactive power
compensation. Transmission STATCOM is limited to high
power rating switch, which can only work at low switching
frequency. It usually adopts indirect-current control method to
control the phase angle between inverter AC output voltage
and system voltage to regulate reactive power output [3-4].
However, there is no such limitation for distribution
STATCOM, which commonly uses high switching frequency
semiconductor power switches, such as IGBT and IGCT. With
the help of these switches, it can employ direct-current control
method that has quick responses and high control precision.
Though these switches like IGBT can work at very high
switching frequency, they may lead to large switching loss and
reduce the service life of switches if working under such
circumstances. So how to lower switching frequency without
affecting high responses speed is a hard task and a hotspot
nowadays [5].

978-1-4673-1172-4/12/$31.00 2012 IEEE

STATCOM MAIN CIRCUIT CONFIGURATION AND

CONTROL PRINCIPLE

The main circuit configuration and control principle of

STATCOM is shown in Fig. 1. The main circuit configuration
mainly consists of the following several parts. (1)The
capacitor at DC side, which is used to provide voltage support
for STATCOM, and filter the ripple of inverter input current.
(2) The voltage source inverter (VSI) consisted of power
electronic switch devices (IGBT or GTO) inverts DC voltage
into AC voltage. The phase, magnitude and frequency of AC
voltage of inverter can be regulated through controlling power
electronic switch on and off according to the requirements of
compensation. (3) The connecting reactors these form
electrical coupling between system voltage and AC voltage of
inverter. It can filter the higher harmonic current and make the
output voltage waveforms approximate to sinusoid waves.
iLa
iLb
iLc

usa
usb
usc

udc

icc icb ica

udcref

usabc
PLL

sin/ cos abc

usd

PI
idref

ud
dq
uq

dq usq

iLabc

abc

iqref

dq

icabc abc
dq

id
iq

sin/ cos

decouple
controller

u u
SVPWM

uca

ucb

ucc

Figure 1. The main circuit and control principle of STATCOM.

191

udc

State mathematic model can be obtained from main circuit,

as shown in formula (1). L is the inductance value of
connecting reactor, R the equivalent resistance of inverter loss,
uc the output AC voltage of inverter, us the system voltage.

d id R wL id usd ucd
=
+

dt iq wL R iq usq ucq

(3)

By Laplace transformation, formula (3) is converted into

ia u sa uca
ia
d

L ib = u sb ucb + R ib
dt
ic u sc ucc
ic

(1)

The control algorithm of STATCOM can be summarized

as follows. The controller employs Park transformation and
phase-locked loop (PLL) to calculate the reactive current
component iqref of load current iLabc. The active current
reference signal idref can be generated by using PI regulator to
adjust DC voltage reference Udcref and its feedback value Udc.
By Park transformation, the output compensation current iabc is
converted into two parts: active component id and reactive
component iq. Similarly, through Park transformation the
system voltage uabc is converted into usd and usq. Input these
transformed signals into active-reactive current decouple
controller, which will output voltage vector (ud, uq). Through
dq/ coordinate transformation, the ud and uq are converted to
u and u which are required by SVPWM generator. Finally,
the SVPWM generator will generate six-channel PWM signals
to drive IGBTs on and off, and then the desired reactive power
will be obtained.
III.

Id (S ) R wL Id (S ) Usd (S ) Ucd (S )
LS
=
+

Iq (S ) wL R Iq (S ) Usq (S ) Ucq (S )

The structure diagram of STATCOM system can be got

from (4), as shown in Fig. 2. It is obvious to see that the active
and reactive currents are coupled by connecting reactors. The
variation of reactive current iq will bring about the variation of
active current id, similarly, the variation of active current id
will bring about the variation of reactive current iq. It will lead
to difficulty in control. However, it would be good for control
after three-phase AC current under abc three-phase coordinate
system is transformed into two-phase DC current under dq
coordinate system, and PI controllers can be adopted to make
the output eliminate the steady state error. To obtain the best
control results, next, the id and iq will be decoupled.
Expand (3):

did

ucd = usd L dt Rid + wLiq

u = u L diq Ri + wLi
sq
q
d
cq
dt

ACTIVE-REACTIVE CURRENT DECOUPLE UNDER DQ

COORDINATE SYSTEM

To begin with, transforming (1) under abc three-phase

coordinate system into the equations under dq0 coordinate
system by Park transformation. The Park transformation
matrix T is given as follows.
cos(wt ) cos(wt 2 /3) cos(wt + 2 /3)
2
T = sin(wt) sin(wt 2 /3) sin(wt +2 /3)
3
1/ 2

1/2
1/2

(4)

(5)

Introducing two intermediate variables x1, x2, assume that

the controlled output voltages ucd and ucq under dq coordinate
system can be expressed as follows:

ucd = usd Lx1 + wLiq

ucq = usq Lx2 + wLid

(2)

(6)

Substituting (6) back into (3), the active-reactive current

decoupling control expressions can be listed as shown in

Where w=2f, f is the fundamental wave frequency of system

AC voltage. Then

id
ia


i
=
T
q
ib ,
i
ic
0

usd
usa


u
=
T
sq
usb ,
u
usc
s0

ucd
uca


u
=
T
cq
ucb
u
ucc
c0

Because STATCOM is a three-phase three-wire system,

the sum of three phase currents is zero. So the i0 is always
zero, then 0-axis component can be eliminated after transform
[6]. At last, the state mathematic model under dq0 coordinate
system can be expressed as follows.

d id L
=
dt iq
0

0 i
d x1
+
x
R i
q 2
L

(7)

Regard x1 and x2 as the control variables of the output

voltages ucd and ucq at inverter AC side, regulate x1 and x2 by PI
regulator.
Kid

*
x1 = ( K pd + s )(id id )

x = ( K + Kiq )(i * i )
pq
q
q
2
s

192

(8)

Where Kpd, Kid, Kpq, Kiq are the parameters of PI regulator.

The equivalent control diagram of id-iq can be drawn from
(7), as shown in Fig. 3.
By this, there will be no relationship between id and iq
anymore, and they are successfully decoupled. After decouple,
an inner current loop control method, which bases on dq
coordinate system, is got. The diagram of decoupling control
is shown in Fig. 4. In this figure, id* and iq* are active and
reactive reference currents respectively. The value of id* is
correlative with voltage udc at DC side, while iq* directly
reflects the reactive power requirement of the power system.
uc and uc are the control voltages of output. They are input
into SVPWM generator to generate corresponding PWM
signals to drive the inverter.

ucd

usd

R
+

id

1/SL

+
wL
wL

ucq

usq

multitudinous modulations for inverter. In the complex

plane, with SVPWM technology, space voltage vector is
composed by the reference voltages of inverter. With the
combination of different switching actions, it can
approximate the reference space voltage vector. Compared
with the conventional SPWM, SVPWM reduces 1/3 of
switching frequency, and the utilization of DC voltage
enhances 15%. Furthermore, it produces fewer harmonic
components, and can realize easily in digital signal processor
(DSP) [7].

A. The principle of space voltage vector PWM

As shown in Fig. 1, the three-phase inverter consists of
three sets (6 IGBTs). O point, the negative terminal of the
DC capacitor, is set as reference voltage zero point. When
the upper switch is on, and the under switch is off (using
S=1 to indicate this state), the output phase voltage equals
to Udc. When the upper switch is off, and the under switch
is on (using S=0 to indicate this state), the output phase
voltage equals to 0. The expression of space vector
synthesized by three-phase voltage can be given, as
detailed in

iq

1/SL

U ref =

R
Figure 2. The structure diagram of STATCOM system.

id * +

PI

iq* +

x1

1
LS + R

id

x2

1
LS + R

iq

PI

2
U dc ( S a + Sb + 2 Sb ) =e j2 / 3
3

(8)
.

There are 23 combinations of switching actions in the

three-arm inverter. Eight basic space voltage vectors can
be got by substituting the switching states into (8), including
six active vectors (V1-V 6) and two zero vectors (V0, V7). The
active vectors form a regular hexagon plant and six sectors
numbered I to VI in the stationary reference coordinate system
[8], as illustrated in Fig. 5.
JG
V 2 (010)

JG
V 6 (110)

II
Figure 3. The equivalent control diagram of id-iq.

U ref

id*

PI

x1

usd

III
+
+

id

wL

id

iq* +

x2

uc
dq

uc *

S
V
P
W
M

P
W
M

JG
V 4T1

JG
V 4 (100)

U ref

V
JG
V 1 (001)

usq +

SPACE VOLTAGE VECTOR PWM TECHNOLOGY

U ref

VI

IV

ucq*

At present, Sinusoidal Pulse Width Modulation

(SPWM) and Space Vector Pulse Width Modulation
(SVPWM) are applied most widely and actively among the

Figure 4. The diagram of active-reactive current decoupling control.

IV.

JG
V 0 (000)
JG
V 7 (111)

JG
V 3 (011)

ucd*

wL

PI

JG
V 6T2
60

JG
V 5 (101)

Figure 5. The basic voltage vectors and sectors distribution map.

The synthesized voltage vector rotates in the six sectors

at angular frequency 2f. This vector is synthesized by
zero voltage vectors and the two adjacent active voltage
vectors of the sector where the reference vector locates.
The angle and amplitude of the equivalent control vector
can be obtained by properly distributing the action time of
each vector, and approximate the reference voltage as

193


3Ts
1
T1 = ( 3U ref U ref )
2
U dc

3Ts

T2 = U ref
U dc

T = T T T
s
1
2
0

(9)
.

B. SVPWM in the application of STATCOM

Through Clark transformation, the three-phase
reference voltages are converted into a synthesized
reference voltage vector Uref. The components of Uref
under  coordinate are detailed in Fig. 5, and then Uref can
be expressed as

U ref = U ref + jU ref

(10)

Uref and Uref corresponds exactly to the decoupling

outputs, uc* and uc*, which means the decoupling output is a
synthesized reference voltage vector. Therefore, the
control algorithm employed fits the SVPWM generator
very well.
C. The optimization of synthesizing space vector
After the sector where the synthesized vector locates is
confirmed, how to determine the time when each vector begins
acting is very important, because it will determine when the
switches begin acting. The order of activating vectors would
affect directly number of switching. In order to cut down the
number, in principle, only one set switching devices are
involved when it needs to switch. In the application of sevensegment space vector synthesizing method, it begins and ends
with zero vector V0 (000), the zero vector V7 (111) is in the
middle, properly arranging the rest time will be done. The
working order of vectors is shown in Fig. 6.
zero
vector
(000)

active
vector
A

active
vector
B

zero
vector
(111)

active
vector
B

zero
active
vector vector
(000)
A

switching device is changed state when vector ought to

switch. Therefore, the switching frequency is lowered to a
great extent.
Table 1. Acting time table of basic vectors.
Acting time span and sequence

Sector

close as possible. For example, assuming reference voltage

vector to be lying in sector I, the adjacent active vectors are
V4 (100) and V6 (100). To obtain the desired voltage within
the sampling time Ts, the active voltage sectors V4 and V6
ought to be activated during the time T1 and T2
respectively. The rest time of the sampling time is T0,
during which the zero voltage vectors are activated.
According to Fig. 5, the dwell timeT0, T1 and T2 are
calculated by the following formulas:

T0/4
zero
vector
(000)

T1/2
active
vector
A

T2/2
active
vector
B

T0/4
zero
vector
(111)

T2/2
active
vector
B

T1/2
active
vector
A

T0/4
zero
vector
(000)

000

100

110

111

110

100

000

II

000

010

110

111

110

010

000

III

000

010

011

111

011

010

000

IV

000

001

011

111

011

001

000

000

001

101

111

101

001

000

VI

000

100

101

111

101

100

000

V.

SIMULATION AND ANALYSIS

To validate the compensation performance of

STATCOM after employing the proposing control
algorithm, a simulation model is built in Matlab/Simulink
environment. Design reactive power compensation
capacity is 50kvar. The main parameters of STATCOM
model are shown as follows.
As shown in Fig. 1, the system line-to-line voltage
Us=380V, the equivalent resistance R=0.1, connecting
reactor L=3.6mH, DC side capacitor C=4700F, DC reference
Udcref =700V. There are two kinds of load in this model, fixed
load and dynamic load. The fixed load capacity is
50kVA/+30kvar, and the dynamic load capacity is 10kVA/50kvar. The sampling frequency of SVPWM is set at 5kHz.

A. Simulation and analysis under fixed load

When system is running under fixed load, before
switching STATCOM into system, it should charge the DC
capacitor close to 700V. STATCOM is switched into
system at t=0.04s, the simulation results can be seen in
Fig.7. It shows the voltage and current waveforms of Aphase before and after compensation. It reveals that the
phase of current is lagging the voltage about 20, after
compensation, the phases of voltage and current are almost
coincident. The power factor rises from 0.875 to 0.99. It is
noteworthy that the current becomes small after
compensation. This is because there is almost no reactive
current component being transmitted in power system,
reactive power has been provided by STATCOM. So the
system only needs to provide active power, and then it can
enhance the capacity of existing transmission network.

Figure 6. The working order of vectors.

According to Fig. 6, the basic vectors acting time of

reference voltage vector in each sector can be conformed,
as detailed in table. 1. From table it is known that only one

194

500

500
Isa

Usa

300

300

100
0
-100

100
0
-100

V/A

V/A

Usa

-300

-300
-500

Isa

-500
0

0.02

0.04

0.06
t/s

0.08

0.1

0.12

0.02

0.04

0.06

0.08

0.1
t/s

0.12

0.14

0.16

0.18

0.2

Figure 8. The voltage and current waveforms of system before and after
compensation under dynamic load

Figure 7. The voltage and current waveforms of system before and after
compensation under fixed load.

500

Fig. 9 is the output current waveform of STATCOM.

When the load is inductive, STATCOM outputs a leading
current to compensate the system lagging current. When the
load is capacitive, STATCOM outputs a lagging current to
compensate the system leading current. The transition of
current is smooth and rapid, without oscillation. It is suggested
that this control system has a better robustness.
Fig. 10 is the reactive power waveforms of reference and
STATCOM output. After STATCOM startup, the output can
track the reactive load within one cycle. At steady state, the
variation range of output is merely 50var. It is shown the
control system has good steady state characteristic. It is further
proved that STATCOM of employing this control algorithm
can get good compensation effect.

Ica

V/A

100
0
-100
-300
-500

0.02

0.04

0.06

0.08

0.1
t/s

0.12

0.14

0.16

0.18

0.2

Figure 9. The current waveform of STATCOM output.

4

x 10

2
Q/var

Fig. 8 is the system voltage and current waveforms of

A-phase before and after compensation under dynamic
load. When the load changes suddenly from large
inductive into large capacitive, or from large capacitive
into large inductive, STATCOM uses only 1/4 cycle to
adjust the current phase. Therefore, when the system produces
large load disturbance, STATCOM controller can precisely
and quickly track reactive load. So it has good dynamic
characteristic.

Usa
300

0
Qref
Q
-2
-4

0.02

0.04

0.06

0.08

0.1
t/s

0.12

0.14

0.16

0.18

0.2

Figure 10. The reactive power waveforms of reference and STATCOM output.
750
700
650
Udc
V

B. Simulation and analysis under dynamic load

On the condition that system is running under fixed
load, STATCOM is switched into system at t=0.00s,
dynamic load is switched into system at t=0.06s and cut at
t=0.14s. The simulation results can be seen in the
following figures.

600
550
500

Fig. 11 is the voltage waveform of DC side. It should cut

off the PWM signals before STATCOM startup, and then
compose uncontrolled rectifier by the anti-parallel diodes of
IGBT module to charge DC capacitor. When the DC voltage
closes to system AC peak voltage, the PWM signals can be
switched into inverter. Then the inverter works at rectifying
and inverting state to regulate DC voltage. As illustrated in
Fig.11, it is taken merely 3 cycles for DC voltage to rise up to
700V, and then it enters steady state. There is only a little of
fluctuation when the load is largely changing. So this system
has better dynamic and steady state characteristics for DC
voltage regulation, which provides guarantee for STATCOM
to compensate reactive power precisely.

450

0.02

0.04

0.06

0.08

0.1
t/s

0.12

0.14

0.16

0.18

0.2

Figure 11. The voltage waveform of DC side.

VI.

CONCLUSION

A control algorithm for SVPWM-based STATCOM using

active-reactive current decouple under dq coordinate system is
proposed. The simulation results show that STATCOM based
on this control algorithm can precisely and quickly track
active-reactive current, compensate reactive power. It also
proves the excellent dynamic and steady-state performances of
this STATCOM. With SVPWM-optimized technology, the
switching frequency is lowered, and fewer harmonics are

195

produced. The feasibility and effectiveness of this control

method are verified. It could provide reference for practical
application which requests fewer harmonic and higher
dynamic and steady-state performances.
ACKNOWLEDGMENT
The authors would like to gratefully acknowledge the
financial support of the Natural Science Foundation of China
project (Grant No. 51067002/E070302), the Guangxi
technology tackle key research project (Grant No. 111070149), and the Guangxi Ministry of Education (Grant No.
201012MS093).

[2]

[3]

[4]

[5]

[6]

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