Utilization of the Modulated Power Filter Compensator scheme for grid connected tidal energy utilization systems

Tidal energy is a cheap, clean and abundant source of energy that can be used to feed isolated loads as well as grid connected ones. The variation of output power with the continuous variation of tides can cause significant power quality issues. This paper studies a network presenting a rural load, such as a small village, fed from a tidal turbine that is connected to a weak grid. The effect of the variation in tides on the power quality is illustrated via simulation. The introduction of the Modulated Power Filter Compensator (MPFC) to the network establishes a significant improvement to the power quality. The proposed MPFC is a cheap and robust FACTS based device. It is controlled via a tri-loop dynamic error-driven PI controller. This scheme proved its ability to introduce a significant improvement which is illustrated via comparing the simulation results of the studied network with and without the MPFC.