1378 IEEE Transactions on Power Delivery, Vol. 13, No.
4, October 1998
P.W. Lehn M.R. Iravani
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
University of Toronto
Toronto, Ontario M5S 3 6 4
Canada
Abstract- This paper presents a new approach for t h e
dynamic control of FACTS apparatus, such as t h e STAT-
CQM and UPFC, which utilize voltage source inverters
(VSI) as t h e main building block. The control concept is
based on a linearization of the dq inverter model. Feed-
forward techniques which are traditionally used for t h e
approximate decoupling of d and q-axis control a r e dis-
carded in favour of a high gain full state feedback ap-
proach which assigns both closed loop system poles and,
more importantly, their associated eigenvectors. Experi-
mental validation of t h e approach is carried out on a lab-
oratory STATCQM setup. Due to the nonlinear n a t u r e
of t h e VSI equations and the uncertainty of ac system pa-
rameters, actual closed loop system dynamics can s t r a y
quite dramatically from the desired. Root locus analy-
sis is therefore performed t o investigate the small signal
system dynamic behaviour. The loci demonstrate t h a t
t h e effect of system nonlinearity on the closed loop poles
is virtually eliminated by t h e proposed control. T h e ef-
fect of a c system parameter variations is also shown t o
be minimal.
Keywords- FACTS, STATCOM, control, dynamic mod-
eling
I. INTRODUCTION
Recent advances in the power handling capabilities
of static switches has made the use of the voltage
source inverters (VSI) feasible at both the transmission
and distribution levels. As a result, a variety of VSI
based equipment such as the static compensator (STAT-
COM) and the unified power flow controller (UPFC)
have joined the previous generation of semiconductor
based equipment t o make flexible ac transmission sys-
tems (FACTS) possible.
The ability of this new FACTS equipment t o control
system power flows as well as improve system stability
have been well documented [l],[a]. In spite of the in-
terest in this FACTS equipment however, very little in-
PE-198-PWRD-0-12-1997 A paper recommended and approved by
the IEEE Transmission and Distribution Committee of the IEEE Power
Engineering Society for publication in the IEEE Transactions on Power
Delivery Manuscript submitted July 16, 1997; made available for
printing December 12, 1997.
0885-8977/98/$10.00 0 1997 IEEE
C osed Loop
formation regarding its dynamic control or performance
has been published. As a result, the transient response
of such equipment to faults and load fluctuations is un-
available. In addition, the effect of system variations
on the closed loop dynamic performance of the overall
system is also poorly documented.
This paper focuses on the control of a single VSI tak-
ing into the account the effect of possible loading on
the dc bus. The concepts are therefore applicable to
both control of the STATCOM and of the excitation
stage of a UPFC. Modeling and control of the system
is carried out in the synchronous dq-frame, as is quite
standard [3], [4].Although still based on the dq-frame
model, the control design strays from the standard tech-
niques which attempt to approximately decouple d and
q-axis quantities. Instead, a linear multi-variable ap-
proach based on state space theory is employed, which
permits the entire eigenstructure of the closed loop sys-
tem t o be assigned [ 5 ] . The proposed approach yields
better dynamic decoupling of the d and q-axis currents
than is achieved by conventional techniques. This al-
lows higher feedback gains to be used which reduces the
inverter response time and attenuates any disturbances
which might enter the system.
In order to confirm positive simulation results, the
proposed control scheme is implemented in a DSP con-
troller board and tested on a 5kVA laboratory setup.
The dynamic performance of the experimental system
proved excellent under all tests performed. Although
both simulation and experimental testing validate the
proposed design, no quantitative measure of the robust-
ness of the controller to parameter variations is readily
obtained from a handful of specific tests. To ensure the
robustness of the controller, as well as to offer insight
into t o the interaction between the ac system and the
VSI dynamics, a root locus analysia is performed.
II. THE STATCOM DYNAMIC MODEL
Figure 1 shows the schematic diagram of a STAT-
COM, where the inverter ‘on’ state switch resistances,
are lumped in with the transformer leakage resistance,
while switching losses are approximated by a shunt dc
side resistance. Due to the nature of the VSI, the ac
currents always sum to zero, independent of the ac sys-
tem connection. Only two of the three line currents can

u v v
sa sb sc
Fig. 1. Schematic of the basic STATCOM
therefore be define as system states, and these will be
taken t o be a, and i b . The current in phase c will then
simply be a linear combination of the two defined states.
Based on the model of Figure 1, the system can be rep-
resented by three differential equations.
d i a / d t = -R/Lia + l/L(-vta + vSa)
d i b l d t = -R/Lib -I-1/L(-vtb -I-V s b )
(2)
dvdc/dt = -Vdc/RdcC f idc/C - il/c (3)
The equations are coupled by a power balance across
the ideal inverter. Since an inverter with a floating dc
link is used, its terminal voltage can have no zero se-
quence component. The current i d c can therefore be
expressed as a function of the two ac currents and two
system inputs, U t a and vtb .
Vdcidc +
= 2vtaia 2vtbib + Vtaib + Vtbia
Assuming the system voltage also has no zero se-
quence component, all voltages and currents can be first
uniquely represented by equivalent space phasors and
then transformed into the synchronous frame [6]. Trans-
forming the equations and employing the power balance
equation (4),yields the complete VSI model in the dq-
frame:
d i d l d t = -R/Lid +W i q 1/L(-vtd f U&)
di,/dt = -wid - R / L i q + l/L(-vtq + vSq)
- 3(vtdid + vtqiq) ----
dvdc - vdc il
- (7)
dt 2cvdc RdcC C
where Vsd and vsq are the d and q-axis components of
the ac bus voltage. The quantities V t d and vtq are the
d and q-axis components of the VSI terminal voltage,
neglecting all harmonics which are near to, or above,
the VSI switching frequency. For implementation these
quantities must be converted into a modulation index,
ma, and phase, 6, as per equation (8). The modulation
index and phase should however not be directly used
as system inputs as this would unnecessarily introduce
additional nonlinearities into they system equations.
(IC is a constant whose amplitude depends on the mod-
ulation technique used)
1379
111. VSI CONTROL
Since current control of the VSI has eclipsed phase
amplitude control, inverter dynamics have improved
dramatically. With conventional current controllers,
emphasis has been primarily on attempting to decouple
the d and q-axis current regulators through feedforward.
PI controllers are then typically employed in each of the
two approximately decoupled loops to reach the speci-
fied reference inputs [3],[7]. DC link voltage is left t o be
regulated through an additional, e-xternal control loop.
Since the synchronous frame is referenced to the ac
system bus, under balanced steady state conditions the
system q-axis voltage is zero. As a result, the power
out of the ac bus is simply given by P, = 3/2V,did, i.e.
the power is proportional to the d-axis current. Based
on this, the external control loop regulating the dc link
(1) voltage is used t o supply the d-axis current reference
command, and thereby regulate the power into the ca-
pacitor. This approach leads to reasonably rapid re-
sponse, although finally the bandwidth of such control
is limited by
the inaccuracy of the assumption that the power P,
out of the ac bus is equal to the power into the dc ca-
pacitor - this is true only if the system is balanced and
in the steady state
0 the need for three PI regulators, each of which has
a detrimental effect on the phase margin of the closed
loop system
(4) 0 the fact that the approximate decoupling considers
only dq coupling resulting from the ac side inductance
and neglects the fact that the quantities are also cou-
pled, albeit t o a lesser extent, through the dc capacitor
voltage.
A . The Linearized Model
To allow the equations to be expressed in standard
(5) state variable form, the states are collected in the vec-
tor x while the controllable inputs, which are the VSI
(6) terminal voltages, are represented by U. All other quan-
tities are considered disturbances, and will be lumped
into the vector d . The definitions are therefore as fol-
lows:
r - .
Using these definitions, the equations ( 5 ) - (7) can be
expressed as
j , = f(x, U, d , t ) . (9)
from which the linearized equations are readily deter-
mined using the Jacobian. The resulting linearized ma-
trix equation is given by
x = Ax + Buf Ed. (10)
Since the equations are based on the Jacobian evaluated
at a particular operating point, they only accurately rep-
resent the system at, or in the vicinity of, this point. As
1380
will be seen later however, the application of high gain
feedback t o the system will help minimize the effect of
nonlinearities which in turn results in a very low sensi-
tivity t o variations in the selected operating point.
3. Eigenstructure Assignment
Given the linearized equations, a full state feedback
gain matrix can be designed based on the principle of
complete eigenstructure assignment [ 5 ] . Eigenstructure
assignment is made possible by the fact that a single
input is generally sufficient to place the closed loop sys-
tem poles a t a desired location. In cases where more
than one input is available it is often possible t o stip-
ulate further design criteria. For the two input system
of the VSI, it is in fact possible to define both closed
loop pole locations of the linearized model, as well as t o
completely decouple the ac reactive current from the dc
capacitor voltage and the d-axis current.
Naturally pole locations must be chosen wisely and
can clearly not be selected beyond the limitations im-
posed by the transport delay of the inverter. In addition,
if a large dc capacitor is used, then the mode associated
with the capacitor voltage must be kept slow. If the
capacitor pole is placed too far into the left hand plane,
then excessively large charging/discharging currents will
result when the dc voltage reference is changed or the
voltage is disturbed.
Since the mode associated with the capacitor volt-
age may be up to an order of magnitude slower than
the desired response speed of the reactive current con-
troller, it is clearly important for the eigenstructure t o
be such, that this mode doesn’t appear in i,. This is a
dynamic constraint and can therefore only be achieved
by eigenstructure assignment, since quasi-steady state
assumptions do not hold in this time frame.
In addition t o this constraint, it is also desired that
the system display no oscillatory behaviour and be well
damped. This is accomplished by ensuring the closed
loop eigenvalues lie on the negative real axis. Due t o
the nature of the system equations it is possible t o meet
all of these constraints simply by selecting the system
poles t o be at {-A,-A, -7). The single pole at -11,
corresponding t o the charging and discharging of the
capacitor, would generally be the nearest to the origin.
Employing these pole locations results in a closed loop
system disturbance response which has the form
The reactive current response therefore has a time
constant determined purely by the selected pole loca-
tion -A. This pole can be moved as far into the left
hand plane as the transport delay of the inverter per-
mits. X can be of the order of half the inverter switching
frequency (A x f,/2).
Ed
n
X
r
Fig. 2. Block diagram of the STATCOM with full state feedback
applied
Applying full state feedback t o the system and allow-
ing for an external reference input x, yields the block
diagram shown in Figure 2 . The corresponding system
equation, (12), is obtained by letting U = -K(x - x,).
k = A x - BK(x - x T ) + E d (12)
It is worth mentioning that the identical feedback ma-
trix, K, could have been obtained by taking an optimal
control approach, with the appropriate state and in-
put weights. The eigenstructure assignment technique
however, avoids the task of explicitly specifying these
weights, and instead allows the closed loop dynamics t o
be manipulated more directly.
C. Elimination of Steady State Errors
The dynamics of the VSI are determined by the con-
stant state feedback resulting from the eigenstructure
assignment. Even in the case of a linear system, full
state feedback does not necessarily guarantee a step re-
sponse with zero steady state error. For linear systems,
however, these errors can be entirely eliminated by ap-
propriate feedforward. While the nonlinearity of the
VSI equations prevents exact elimination of its steady
state error, the linearized equations can be used to give a
first order approximation to the amount of feedforward
which should be applied.
The feedforward term is added to the system input,
yielding a new input to the VSI.
=v - K(x - x,)
U (13)
Since the external input v is not a function of the
state, its introduction affects only the steady state and
not the dynamic system performance. In the steady
state, all state derivatives are zero. If zero steady state
error is desired then x = x, and
0 AX, + Bv, - BK(x - x,) + E d . (14)
Since the number of states exceeds the number of in-
puts, the matrix B is not invertible and it is not possible
t o specify an arbitrary steady state x, and find the as-
sociated input. Only certain states can be reached by
the application of a constant input.
It is, however, not our intention t o regulate all three
system states. While the dc bus voltage and the reac-
tive current, must be controlled to their reference input

vdues, the d-axis current may take on whatever value
necessary to achieve these two references. As a result,
equation (14) can be reformulated to solve for the two
inputs and the d-axis current which will yield the de-
sired steady state dc bus voltage and reactive current.
This is accomplished by partitioning of the A matrix.
While the small signal input to the actual VSI is given
by (13), only two state reference values, the reactive cur-
rent, x z r , and dc capacitor voltage, xgr, are external in-
puts. The remaining reference quantities are calculated
according to equation (15). The final block diagram of
the closed loop system with feedforward is the same as
Figure 2 except with the input v, added to summing
junction C2.
Indeed it may be seen that model errors stemming
from inexact representation of the inverter switching
losses or errors in the parameter values used are not
compensated for. These errors are small however, since
all VSI components values can be directly measured,
and do not change. Contrary to the VSI parameter val-
ues, all ac system parameters have been neglected from
the analysis. While their effect on the dynamic sys-
tem performance should not be overlooked, inclusion of
the term Ed in equation (15) eliminates their effect on
steady state quantities.
D. AC Voltage Control
Traditional techniques are used for ac voltage ampli-
tude regulation. For high voltage transmission level ap-
plications where no particular load or load area is com-
pensated for, the only manner of voltage regulation is
through the introduction of a PI voltage control loop.
Such a control loop has a relatively slow response, in the
order of one or even two cycles. While this may seem
extremely slow, the entire philosophy behind VAR com-
pensation for voltage support is based on quasi-steady
state arguments and it is therefore impossible to achieve
response times of much less than a cycle.
For PI voltage controller design, a simplified STAT-
COM model can be employed. By referring back t o
equation ( l l ) , it can be inferred that the reactive cur-
rent of the STATCOM has the same impulse response as
+
the transfer function 1/(Xs 1). In addition, from pha-
sor analysis, the effect of a reactive current injection on
the magnitude of the local bus voltage can be approx-
imated by AlVl M X J , , where X, is the equivalent
system reactance at the bus. Employing these relations
allows the PI voltage controller to be designed using
traditional transfer function based control techniques.
Since it is important that minor bus voltage imbalance
not result in a STATCOM reference reactive current
with a second harmonic component, a second harmonic
1381
Fig. 3. The experimental setup.
notch filter must be employed in the feedback path. In
addition, a certain degree of low pass filtering is also
necessary due to anti-aliasing and noise constraints. As
a result, the dynamics of the voltage control loop will
primarily be dictated by the bus voltage filters in the
feedback path.
In spite of the detailed nature of the STATCOM
model, augmenting the STATCOM model with the AC
system model does not, in general, lead to improved PI
voltage controller designs. This is a consequence of the
wide variation in AC system configuration which may
exist.
IV. EXPERIMENTAL SETUP
The proposed control was designed analytically and
then tested by digital simulation. The simulation model
employed the nonlinear system equations (5) - (7) in
addition to a second order Pad6 approximation of the
inverter transport delay. After rigorous simulation tests
were performed, the control was implemented on a 5kVA
laboratory model. Figure 3 shows a schematic of the
experimental setup.
Both the system and STATCOM parameter values
used are given in the table below.
STATCOM
kVAb = 5 kVA
vb = 110 v vb 110 v
C = 4900 DF V, = 118 V
Control of the STATCOM is performed by a 50MHz
DSP, while the actual inverter gating signals are calcu-
lated in an FPGA. Sinusoidal PWM is employed in the
experimental setup with a carrier frequency of 2880 Hz.
The carrier frequency was selected to give the SPWM
inverter the same transport lag as would exist in a 48
pulse application. A vector control scheme with a 1440
Hz switch frequency would exhibit the same lag.
Independent of the switching strategy that is adopted,
the dynamics of the system are primarily dictated by the
1382

4
3
0
- - $
3
4O
72
J -1
0 0.005 0.01 0.015 0.02 0.025 0.03 0.035 0.04
1.
h
3
n

.-
-1 -I

0 0005 001 0015 002 0025 003 0035 0.04 0 0.005 0.01 0.015 0.02 0.025 0.03 0.035 0.04
1321 1.321

~I,,/ , , , , , , , { 1.
1.240 0.005 0.01 0.015 002 0025 0.03 0035 0.04
1.24
0 0.005 0.01 0.015 0 02 0.025 0.03 0.035 0.04
time (s) time (s)

Fig. 4. System response to a change in the reference reactive Fig. 5 . System response to a change in the reference reactive
power command from -0.5 to +0.5pu. power command from $0.5 to - 0 . 5 ~ ~ .

number of discrete voltage vectors which can be imple- h 05

mented in one period. The specific strategy used pre-
dominantly affects only steady state conditions, such as
the harmonic spectra of the voltage and current wave-
forms. 0 0.005 0.01 0.015 0.02 0.025 0.03 0.035 0.04

The controller was designed to yield closed loop poles

of (-1800, -1800, -400) when the reactive current is
zero, the dc capacitor voltage is at its nominal value
of 1.277pu, and the ac bus voltage is at 1 . 0 3 ~ ~ . .e451
0
,
0.005
,
0.01
,
0.015
,
0.02
,
0.025
I

0.03
,
0.035
4
0.04
V. EXPERIMENTAL RESULTS
1.32r
1-
' r - - - - - l

The inner control loop which regulates the STAT- h

3 13-
Q
% J-
COM states is first tested. The objective is to follow I; 28:
a reactive current reference command, i,, , while main- p 126-
taining the dc link voltage at a fixed value stipulated 124l I
0 0.005 0.01 0.015 0.02 0.@5 0.03 0.035 0.04
by ?Jdcr. Figure 4 shows the STATCOM response t o a time (s)
step change in the reactive current command from neg-
ative half rated, to positive half rated current. Figure 5 Fig. 6. System response to a step change in the dc load current
from 0 to f0.46pu.
shows the same step change, in the opposite direction.
Real and reactive currents as well as the dc voltage are
all show=, along with their reference values. a 2.3 kW load is switched in across the dc capacitor of
It is apparent from the traces that the lack of an in- the 5 kVA inverter. The resulting transient response is
tegral component in the control loop results in steady depicted in Figure 6. The closed loop system dynamics
state errors in the reactive current which are too small can clearly be seen in this figure. The real ac current
t o be distinguished from background noise. Only in the which is comprised of two components, as per equation
dc capacitor voltage can a slight steady state error be (ll),rapidly equalized the power imbalance. This is
seen. This can be distinguished only because the volt- accomplished with a time constant of 1 / X In addition
age is very stable and noise levels axe low. Appropriate the slower mode, with time constant 1/77, charges the
' capacitor back to its pre-disturbance level.
selection of the pole location associated with the dc ca-
pacitor voltage can easily maintain steady state error It should be realized that the existence of a dc volt-
well below 1%of the reference dc voltage level. age sag under these circumstances is unavoidable. This
One additional test is performed on the inner control results from the fact that the dc current from the capac-
loop. Although in STATCOM applications there is no itor t o the load can be instantaneously varied while the
external drain on the dc capacitor voltage, in UPFC and reactance on the ac side of the inverter impose a con-
other applications this is not the case. A comprehensive straint on the maximum rate of change of current into
control strategy should therefore be capable of rejecting the inverter.
such disturbances t o the dc bus. In order to test this Aside from keeping the dc voltage sag small, it is here
 1383
1.03 I I

’ 3i 0.97
0 0.02 0.04 0.06 0.08 0.1 0.12 0.14 0.16 0.18 0.2

S
Q
v

.-d-1 Iqr
0 0.02 0.04 0.06 0.08 0.1 0.12 0.14 0.16 0.18 0.2 0 0.02 0.04 0.06 0.08 0.1 0.12 0.14 0.16 0.18 0.2

h
1
7
Q
v
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
e o .......................

.-G-1
0 0.02 0.04 0.06 0.08 0.1 0.12 0.14 0.16 0.18 0.2 0 0.02 0.04 0.06 0.08 0.1 0.12 0.14 0.16 0.18 0.2
time (s) time (s)
Fig. 7. Response of the voltage controller to tripping of a feeder Fig. 8. Response of the voltage controller to tripping of a load
(SI opens). (S3 opens).

very clearly seen from the traces that the controller also
decouples the reactive current regulation from both dc
bus voltage and d-axis current variations.
As already stated in Section 111, an external voltage
control loop can be introduced to regulate the ac bus
voltage amplitude. Ac bus voltage variations can result
from either changes in source or load configurations, and
both these scenarios are investigated. Referring back t o
Figure 3, it can be seen that two similar feeders as well
as two separate loads are connected to the STATCOM
bus through breakers (5’1t o 5’4).
Figure 7 depicts the transient response of the system
when one of the two feeder trips off (SIopens) while
supplying both loads. The droop characteristic of the
voltage controller results in the post-event ac voltage
being somewhat lower than the reference, while the pre-
event voltage was somewhat higher. It is clear that this
scenario represents a case where the impedance between
the ideal ac system voltage and the STATCOM termi-
nals changes rather dramatically. This change, however,
seems t o have little effect on the closed loop performance
of the STATCOM.
The last test performed is that of a tripping of a part
of the load. Figure 8 show the transient response to the
tripping off of the 6kVA load. Performance similar t o
that of the last case is seen.
VI. DISCUSSION OF RESULTS
As demonstrated by the experimental results, the in-
ner STATCOM control loop appears to function nearly
identically under all conditions. This seems counter-
intuitive since the controller is designed based only on
a linearization about one specific operating point. Also,
with exception of the PI voltage controller, the entire
control structure was designed without the knowledge
of ac system parameters under either nominal or contin-
gency conditions. Only the parameter values associated
with the actual FACTS equipment were needed in the
design, i.e. the transformer impedance, the dc capacitor
value and an approximate model of the inverter losses.
This evokes two questions regarding the dynamic per-
formance of the closed loop system:
1) how does the operating point affect the dynamics
2) how does the introduction of, and variations in, the
ac system impedance affect the dynamics.
Clearly the test cases presented show that the closed
loop dynamic performance of the STATCOM is excel-
lent at least under certain system conditions. Also, the
test cases were chosen to be representative of the types
of disturbances a STATCOM might be subject t o in the
field. Nonetheless, neither of these facts ensures that the
system even remains stable under other, untested condi-
tions. To resolve this uncertainty, a root locus approach
is used which can at least ensure whether the system is
stable in some range about an operating point.
Consider first how the operating point affects the
closed loop system dynamics. The operating point of
the STATCOM is uniquely d e h e d if the steady state
ac bus voltage amplitude, dc bus voltage amplitude and
the reactive current are known. Neither the ac nor the
dc voltages vary more than a few percent from their
nominal values, due to practical constraints. The effects
of variations in these quantities on the system dynamics
are therefore secondary to the effect of reactive current
changes. Applying the fixed linear controller designed in
Section I11 t o the open loop nonlinear system equations,
yields the set of closed loop nonlinear equations. Lin-
earizing these new equations about i, = 0 yields closed
loop eigenvalues which are located at the specified lo-
cations (since this is the operating point for which the
feedback matrix was designed). Due to the nonlinear-
ity of the equations, however, at other values of reactive
current the eigenvalues are not at the same location.
Figure 9 gives the root locus as the reactive current
1384
- m
2- 50-
-4
;
a
m
O- i flect the associated rightward shift of the system roots.
.4
s -=O
Fig. 9. Root locus as the reactive current increases from -1 to 1
pu (note unequal axis scaling).
Fig. 10. Root locus as the system reactance increases from 0 to
0.2pu, with i, = 0 (note unequal axis scaling).
is varied from -1pu t o i-lpu. As can be seen, the closed
loop dynamics vary only slightly with the changing op-
erating point. This is a result of the high feedback
gain minimizing the effect of the nonlinearity in the sys-
tem equations. Since the poles remain very near the
real axis, the desired nonoscillatory system behaviour is
maintained, independent of reactive current.
To ensure that ac system parameter variations also
don’t adversely affect the closed loop STATCOM dy-
namics, an additional root locus analysis is performed.
The system of Figure 3 is again used, with switches
SI,S3 and S4 open. Assuming that the XIR ratio of
the ac system stays approximately constant, the system
impedance is allowed t o vary from 0 to 0.2~14while the
reactive current supplied by the STATCOM is held at
zero. It should be expected that such a parameter vari-
ation move both open and closed loop system poles, but
t o varying degrees. In addition, the voltage at the ac sys-
tem bus which the STATCOM transformer is connected
to, will no longer be constant. As a result this parame-
ter variation also causes a slight shift in operating point
which must also be accounted for. It is assumed that
the voltage behind the system’s transient reactance is
constant.
The case where the system reactance is zero corre-
sponds t o roots lying a t the locations specified by the
pole placement (since ac system reactance was neglected
in the pole placement). As the system reactance in-
creases, the poles move as shown in Figure 10. In this
case the two poles which were placed in the fax left hand
plane move towards the origin somewhat. This does
slow the dynamics a little, but does not destabilize the
system in any way, since the poles basically remain on
the real axis. It should be noted that the transient re-
sults of Figures 4 to 6 were all carried out with an ac
system impedance of 0 . 1 6 ~ and
~ therefore already re-
In addition it should be mentioned that it is better for
the system poles to move towards the right rather than
the left due t o the introduction of ac system reactance,
since a leftward movement of the poles would cause the
transport delay of the inverter to become problematic.
VII. CONCLUSIONS
The linearized dq-frame model is used to design a
multi-variable control for STATCOM and UPFC ap-
plications. Complete eigenstructure assignment is em-
ployed t o ensure reactive current regulation is dynami-
cally decoupled from the other system states, while the
required feedforward terms are found for elimination of
steady state errors.
Experimental tests on a 5kVA laboratory STATCOM
demonstrated that the resulting closed loop system dis-
played rapid and well damped response under all system
conditions. Root locus analysis verified that the closed
loop VSI dynamic performance could be made nearly
independent of both operating point and ac system pa-
rameter values by appropriate controller design.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The authors would like to acknowledge the contribu-
tions of Dr. R. Bonert and Mario Schwegmann whose
help made the experimental validation possible.
References
[l] L. Gyugyi, “Dynamic compensation of ac transmission lines
by solid-state synchronous voltage sources,” IEEE n u n s . o n
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P.W. Lehn received the B.Sc. and M.Sc. degrees in electrical
engineering from the University of Manitoba in 1990 and 1992.
From 1992 until 1994 he was employed by the Network Planning
Group of Siemens AG, in Erlangen, Germany. He is presently a
Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Electrical and Computer
Engineering at the University of Toronto.
M.R. Iravani received his B.Sc. degree in electrical engineering
in 1976 from Tehran Polytechnique University and started his ca-
reer as a consulting engineer. He received his M.Sc. and Ph.D.
degrees also in electrical engineering from the University of Man-
itoba, Canada in 1981 and 1985 respectively. Presently he is a
professor a t the University of Toronto. His research interests in-
clude power electronics and power system dynamics and control.