Power Quality Enhancement in Utility with Photovoltaic Renewable Energy Penetration Using Active Power Filter

In recent era, the efforts for harnessing electrical power from renewable sources increased significantly. Application of power electronics to harness electrical power from renewable energy sources are posing serious power quality issues in grid. When power from such generation units integrated in utility grid it’s power quality, stability, and reliability is getting compromised due to nature of generation and it’s dependency on various factors like irradiance, wind speed etc. The main objective of any electric power utility company shall be providing its end user reliable and quality of power at all time. Strict laws shall be made for power quality parameter compliances to avoid detrimental effects of power quality issues. This paper addresses control of current harmonics using shunt active power filter in utility grid generated by non-linear load. The solar PV energy penetration is used to mitigate harmonics distortion and bring it down to acceptable limits as per international standards. The harmonics mitigation using shunt active power filter with hysteresis current control is presented.