Medium voltage industrial distribution system power quality assessment utilizing multi-resolution decomposition techniques

Power quality problems refer to a wide variety of disturbances that characterize the voltage and current at a given time and at a given location on any power system. The increasing importance of power quality in a deregulated era has emphasized the importance of characterizing different phenomena that occur in voltage and current. This paper focuses on capacitor switching events, which cause a temporary variation in the fundamental frequency voltage magnitude in a medium voltage industrial distribution system. The aim of the paper is to investigate the potential use of both wavelet and fast Fourier transform to identify distinctive characteristics of capacitor switching operation. These characteristics are further utilized to determine the responsible party when transient phenomena related to capacitor switching occurs in the distribution systems. The effects of both voltage level and capacitor location in characterizing switching capacitor phenomena are examined. Based on these studies a general conclusion regarding switching operation is given.