Voltage profile improvement of micro-grids using SMC based STATCOM

Voltage profile improvement has become a challenging issue in micro-grids. With addition of renewable sources like wind energy conversion systems, the task becomes more difficult. Static Synchronous Compensator (STATCOM) is very often utilized to improve the voltage profile of micro-grids. In this work, two micro-grid systems are dynamically modelled and simulated using Matlab/Simulink. The first micro-grid has a single diesel engine driven synchronous generator. The second micro-grid has one diesel engine driven synchronous generator and a doubly fed induction generator based wind energy conversion system. The STATCOM is connected to the load bus in both the micro-grids. Sliding mode controller is used for the control of STATCOM for voltage profile improvement of micro-grid. The performance of sliding mode controller based STATCOM is analysed and compared with the performance of conventional PI controller based STATCOM. The evaluation of performance is done for both the micro-grids. The loads in both the micro-grids are concentrated and time varying. The robustness of the sliding mode controller based STATCOM is established with three different load changes and comparison of the results.