Power Flow Control Solutions in the Romanian Power

System Under High Wind Generation Conditions

Costel CONSTANTIN, Mircea EREMIA, Lucian TOMA
Department of Electrical Power Systems
University Politehnica of Bucharest
Bucharest, Romania
constantin_costel_ro@yahoo.com
AbstractThis paper presents three options to control the power
flows in a transmission network by using three FACTS devices,
that is the Thyristor Controlled Series Capacitor (TCSC), Static
Synchronous Series Compensator (SSSC) and Phase Shifting
Transformer (PST). Simulations are performed in the Eurostag
software on a database of the Romanian transmission system.
The control is focused on the south-east area of the country,
where a large amount of power was installed in wind power
plants.
Index Terms-- Power systems, Power flow control, Thyristor
Controlled Series Capacitor, Static Synchronous Series
Compensator, Phase Shifting Transformer.

I. INTRODUCTION
In the ENTSO-E system the power exchanges between
countries are increasingly larger, i.e., in 2011, the biggest net
exporting countries were France (57.1 TWh), the Czech
Republic (17 TWh) and Bulgaria (10.5 TWh). The main net
importers were Italy (45.8TWh) and Finland (13.9 TWh).
Also in the ENTSO-E system, both exports and imports were
higher in 2011 than in 2010 [1]. This phenomenon is stressing
for the ENTSO-E system where the increase of cross border
exchanges between national systems, which result from the
uneven allocation of the generation, is suturing several
interconnections [2]. Also, the integration of the renewable
energy sources leaded to the power transfers grows and the
power system can become increasingly more difficult to
operate, and the system becomes more insecure, with
unscheduled power flows and higher losses.
In Romania the most of the wind power plants are
concentrated in the South-East area (Dobrogea area), which is
characterized by a power surplus. The closest large important
consumer is the Bucharest city, so that diverting the energy
directly to it is of great importance. High risks are
experienced when, during certain conditions, active power
flows are naturally diverted to flow on the tie lines between
Dobrogea and Bulgaria, which finally may trigger
disconnection of some lines by specific automata. In order to
avoid these situations, three solutions for power flow control

The work has been funded by the Sectoral Operational Programme

Human Resources Development 2007-2013 of the Romanian Ministry of
Labour, Family and Social Protection through the Financial Agreements
POSDRU/107/1.5/S/76903 and POSDRU/89/1.5/S/62557.

are analyzed, i.e. installing a Thyristor Controlled Series

Capacitor, a Static Synchronous Series Compensator or a
Phase Shifting Transformer.
II. THYRISTOR CONTROLLED SERIES CAPACITOR
The Thyristor Controlled Series Capacitor is a FACTS
device which consists of a series capacitor bank connected in
parallel with a thyristor-controlled reactor in order to provide
a variable series capacitive reactance and thus continuous
control of the power flow on the transmission line [3].
A. Steady-state model
The TCSC power flow model presented in this section is
based on the simple concept of a series reactance, that can be
automatically varied so that to allow more power or less
power to flow across the line, as required by the operating
conditions. The value of this variable reactance is efficiently
determined using Newton-Raphson method. The reactance
XTCSC, shown in Figure 1, models all elements that are part of
the TCSC, when operating in either the inductive or the
capacitive regions [4].
m
k
Ik
Im

Vk

XTCSC

Vm

Figure 1. Thyristor controlled series compensator equivalent circuit.

Appling the Kirchhoff theorems, for the above circuit, the

nodal equations result:

I k (V k V m )
I m (V m V k )

1
jX TCSC
1

jX TCSC

Equations (1) can be written in matrix form:

I k X TCSC
I
1
m
j
X TCSC

1
X TCSC
1

jX TCSC

V
k
V m

From the matrix equation (2), the nodal admittance matrix

is obtained:

jBTCSC
Y nn kkTCSC
jBmk

The TCSC parameters are presented in Table I.

TCSC

jBkm

TCSC
jBmm

TABLE I. PARAMETERS OF THE TCSC MODEL

For inductive operation we have:

TCSC
BkkTCSC Bmm

TCSC
TCSC
Bkm
Bmk

1
X TCSC
1

X TCSC

whereas for capacitive operation the signs are reversed.

The active and reactive power equations at bus k are:

Pk VkVm Bkm sin(k m )

Qk Vk2 Bkk VkVm Bkm cos(k m )

Figure 4. Modeling of the PLINE signal.

B. Dynamic model
The control of the value of the reactance XTCSC is
performed according to the diagram from Figure 2 [5].

Parameters
base voltage of the connection node [kV]
time constant [s]
[p.u. (100 MVA, Ubase)]
[p.u. (100 MVA, Ubase)]
[p.u. (100 MVA, Ubase)]

Ubase
T2
XMIN
XMAX
XSC
TPSS
T1PSS
T2PSS
KPSS
KPLINE
KILINE

time constants characterizing the PSS loop

[s]
POD signal gain
gains characterizing the control loop of
active power transit on the line

Value
400
0.02
-0.0145
0.0145
-0.0045
1.0
1.0
1.0
10
0.01
0

III. STATIC SYNCHRONOUS SERIES COMPENSATOR

The Static Synchronous Series Compensator uses a shunt
capacitor which is connected to the transmission line via a
voltage-source converter and a series transformer in order to
produce a controllable voltage, in quadrature with the line
current.
A. Steady-state model
The steady-state model of the SSSC device in series with
a transmission line i-j, can be represented by a voltage source
which has the voltage magnitude VSSSC and the voltage phase
(Fig. 5) [6], [7].

Pij+jQij

ZSSSC

VSSSC

Pji+jQji

Figure 2. Modeling of the XTCSC for dynamic simulations.

The PSS loop based on the signal for the amount of active
power to be transferred by TCSC is represented in Figure 3.

Vi

Vj

Figure 5. Representation of the SSSC device in series with a transmission

line.

Figure 3. Modeling of the POD Power Oscillation Damper signal.

The control loop of active power flow on the line is

performed as shown in the diagram from Figure 4.

The active and reactive power equations which flows

between the nodes i and j are:
PijSSSC Vi 2 GSSSC ViV j GSSSC cos i j BSSSC sin i j

ViVSSSC GSSSC cos i BSSSC sin i

QijSSSC Vi 2 BSSSC ViV j GSSSC sin i j BSSSC cos i j

ViVSSSC GSSSC sin i BSSSC cos i

where:

additional boost voltage. To increase the power flow, the

boost voltage must create an advance phase shift of the
driving line voltage [9].

GSSSC jBSSSC 1/ Z SSSC

Because the SSSC device can modify the power flow on

the transmission line which connect the i node with j node, in
the Newton-Raphson method the power values forced by the
device will be added to the nodal powers of this two nodes:

In steady state a PST can be modeled similar to a

transformer but with complex voltage ratio in series with a
transmission line (Fig. 8). It is assumed that the reactance of
the transformer is included in the transmission line reactance
[10].

Pi new Pi PijSSSC

Qinew Q j PijSSSC

Ii

B. Dynamic model
The basic control strategy of the SSSC device is adopted to
regulate the active power flow. Figure 6 presents the
simplified dynamic model of the SSSC regulator for
controlling the voltage angle of the voltage source converter
[8]. A POD input signal is used for control the damping of the
power oscillations. The maximum phase shift angle between
the two ends of the SSSC is 9.2 degrees.

Vi

max

KPLINE
Active
power
transit

Setpoint value
for active power
transit

1
1+sT2

KPLINE
s

min

Figure 6. Modeling of the SSSC phase shift.

IV. STEADY STATE MODEL OF THE PHASE SHIFTING

TRANSFORMER
A phase shifting transformer creates a phase shift between
the primary and the secondary side. Except for very specific
applications, the purpose of this phase shift is usually the
control of power flow in a complex network.
The natural current distribution is dependent on the
impedance of the lines. This natural distribution may be
rather inefficient, if X1 and X2 are extremely different.

itotal

VPST
itotal

i1

X1

i2

X2

i1+i

X1

i2+i

X2

b)
Figure 7. Current distribution over parallel lines without and with a PSTs
boost voltage: (a) without PST. (b) with PST.

With the introduction of an additional voltage source, a

circulating current can be generated, which equalizes the
currents. Figure 7 gives a simple example for a current
distribution over two lines with and without such an

yik0

yki0

Ik Nik

Ik

Vk

Vk

Figure 8. Equivalent circuit of a PST.

For the scheme represented in Figure 8 we can write the

following matrix equation:
y ik N ik V
I i y ik y ik 0
i
I
*
2
y ik y ki 0 N ik V k
k y ik N ik

Ynn

hence a complex voltage ratio N ik is used for the phase

shifter in the nodal admittance matrix Y nn .
Considering that the role of the PST is to modify the
voltage angle in order to control the power flow through the
line on which it is installed, then we can write:
N ik 1 e j

and thus:

Y ii
j
Y ki e

Y nn

Y ik e j

Y kk

The expression of apparent power for i bus in the presence

of the phase shifting transformer is given by the next
equation:

a)

yik

S i V i Y ii V i Y ik e j V k

resulting the active and reactive power equations:

Pi Vi 2 Gii Vi Vk Gik cos i k Bik sin i k
Qi Vi 2 Bii Vi Vk Bik cos i k Gik sin i k

V. CASE STUDIES
Currently, the total capacity in the Romanian Power
System installed in wind power plants is 1940 MW, of which
1870 MW are located in the Dobrogea region, in the south-

east part of Romania (Fig. 9). This region encounters today a

power surplus that is, sometimes, very difficult to control by
the system operator. As more power will be installed in this
region in the next two year, an efficient solution should be
identified in order to manage the power transfer. One solution
for this problem is to build new electric transmission lines,
but due to the complex legislation, he high costs of the land,
and the duration of construction, new solutions should be
quickly identified.

Figure 10. Active power generated in wind power plants

These large variations from one hour to another of the

power generated by the wind power plants, lead to large
changes of the power flows on the nearby transformers and
the interconnections lines of the Dobrogea region with the
rest of the Romanian power system and with the Bulgarian
power systems (Table II). Also, the actions taken by the
system operator in case of disturbances in the transmission
network are strongly influenced by power generated in the
wind power plants (WPP).
TABLE II.

ACTIVE AND REACTIVE POWER FLOWS

Network element

Figure 9. South-east area of Romanian transmission system.

During winter, the maximum load in the Romanian power

system is about 9500 MW, and the share of wind generation
may reach up to 20% of the total generation. The transfer of
large amount of energy from the Dobrogea region, where an
1400 MW nuclear power plant is in operation, become a
challenging activity for the power system operator.
The active power produced by the wind power plants
shows significant variations during short time intervals,
sometimes from zero to the maximum capacity. During
summer, after dry period, the hydro power plant may not be
appropriately available to balance the additional variation
created by the wind farms.
Furthermore, large variations of the power flows are in the
transmission system may be observed during short time
intervals.
Figure 10 illustrates a SCADA record showing the
variation in the power generated by the wind power plants
located in the analyzed area, during one week [11].

400/110 kV T1 Medgidia
400/110 kV T1, T2 Tulcea
400/110 kV T1, T2 Constana
400 kV OHL Smrdan-Gutina
400 kV OHL G. Ial.- Buc. S.
400 kV OHL Pelicanu-Buc. S.
400 kV OHL Rahman-Dobrudja
400 kV OHL Stupina-Varna
220 kV OHL Barboi-Focani
110 kV OHL Slob. S.-Drag. V.

S [MVA]
30 % WPP

70 % WPP

100 % WPP

68.3 + j23.8
-2.2 + j13.0
55.5 + j32.5
392.8 - j5.9
101.8 - j43.5
125.3 - j42.6
83.9 - j28.9
88.3 -j 24.4
134.3 - j6.6
9.5 + j0.5

-36.2 + 31.2
-69.4 + j26.4
5.5 + j36.3
523.2 - j48.3
282.3 - j63.1
277.9 - j63.4
189.6 - j44.4
207.7 - j41.9
161.1 - j9.1
17.5 - j2.2

-115.1 - j37.2
-119.2 + j35.5
-32.9 + j37.2
615.1 - j63.1
416.1 - j94.8
390.6 - j100.8
266.8 - j64.2
295.2 - j65.5
180.4 - j9.3
22.9 - j5.9

Table II reveals that for large values of the generated

power by the WPPs the direction of the active power flowing
through the power transformers is from the distribution
network to the transmission network. This occurs because a
large number of WPPs are connected in the distribution
network.
The impact of the TCSC, SSSC and PST devices on the
power flows control have been analyzed in this paper. The
simulations have been performed on Dobrogea region of the
Romanian Power System, which has a generated power of
2970 MW, of which 1310 MW are produced in wind power
plants and 1650 MW are exported to other regions.
A. TCSC device in series with the 400 kV OHL Bucureti S.Gura Ialomiei
The purpose is to increase the power flowing on the 400
kV OHL Bucureti S. Gura Ialomiei, and the TCSC device
is set to operate in the capacitive domain. For a capacitive
compensation of 15% of the inductive reactance of the line
the active power will increase by 25 MW, whereas for a
compensation of 30 % the power will increase by 50 MW.

In the case of a disturbance that leads to a change in the

power flow on the studied line, the TCSC device will modify
the compensation reactance in order to maintain the power at
the desired value. Figure 11 shows that for a decrease in the
power flow of 15%, TCSC will command the modification of
the compensation reactance from -0,0045 p.u. to -0,011 p.u.
so that to force the power flow to reach the desired value.

MW
625
620
615
610
605
600

MW

595

305

590

300

10

15

20

25

30

35

40

35

40

[var_-15%] ACTIVE POWER : LINE SMIR4S -GUTI4 -1 Unit : MW

295

(a)
deg
1

290

-0

285

-1

10

12

14

16

18

20

[var_-15%] ACTIVE POWER : LINE GIAL41-R-BUCU4 -1 Unit : MW

-2
-3

(a)

-4
-0.006

-5
0

-0.008

10

15

20

25

30

[var_-15%] VOLTAGE ANGLE AT NODE : SMIR41 Unit : deg

[var_-15%] VOLTAGE ANGLE AT NODE : SMIR4S Unit : deg

-0.010

(b)
Figure 12. Active power flow on the OHL (a) and SSSC phase shift (b).

-0.012

-0.014
0

10

12

14

16

18

20

[var_-15%] MACHINE : TCSC-IN VARIABLE : XC Unit : p.u.

(b)
Figure 11. Active power flow on the OHL (a) and TCSC reactance (b).

B. SSSC device in series with the 400 kV OHL GutinaSmrdan

Assumes that the reference value of the active power flow
on the OHL Gutina - Smrdan is 620 MW, with 100 MW
bigger that in the case without the SSSC device. In order to
maintain the power at the reference value, the phase shift
between the voltages of the two sides of the SSSC is 4,48
degree.
In the case of a disturbance which leads to a decrease in the
power flow on the analyzed line by 30 MW, SSSC will
command the modification of the voltage angle at 5.68
degrees (Fig. 12).

C. PST in series with the 400 kV OHL Rahman-Dobrudja

The solution for which Transelectrica has shown interest
in solving the problem of parasite power flows through
Bulgaria is the phase shift transformer (PST). Assumes that a
PST is installed in series with the 400 kV OHL Rahman
Dobrudja. The characteristics of the considered PST are the
same as the ones of a PST implemented in 2007 in Germany:
1200MVA/400 kV/24/32 taps.
If a three phase short circuit will occur on the 400 kV
OHL Pelicanu Bucureti S., the protection system will
trigger the disconnection of the affected line. After the fault
clearance, the OLTC will command a tap change by the PST,
in order to restore the value of the power exported to Bulgaria
to the reference value (Fig. 13). One can see that in this
scenario, the PST successfully fulfills its objective, so that the
active power is forced to flow on the 400 kV OHL Rahman Dobrudja, with a mismatch of (2-3 MW). Obtaining a value
as close as possible to the desired value depends on the
number of taps of the PST and on the phase shift introduced
by a single tap.

MW
300

250

200

150

10

12

14

16

18

20

[3f_fault] ACTIVE POWER : LINE RAHM41 DOBR-1 Unit : MW

Figure 13. Active power flow on the OHL in presence of the PST.

VI. CONCLUSIONS
The simulations have shown that all the TCSC, SSSC and
PST devices represents effective solutions for active power
flow control and may cope the problems about the power
transfer from the Dobrogea region under the increasing
installed power in wind power plants. However, a cost
analysis should be performed in order to determine the most
effective solution from economical point of view.
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