Optimal planning of static and dynamic reactive power resources

This study proposes an optimisation‐based method of planning static and dynamic VAR sources for the enhancement of electric power transmission systems under a set of contingencies. The overall objective function is to minimise the total installation cost of static and dynamic VAR sources, while satisfying the requirements of long‐term voltage stability margin and transient voltage dip under a contingency list. The backward/forward search algorithm with linear complexity is used to select candidate locations for reactive power compensation. Optimal locations and amounts of static and dynamic VAR sources are obtained by solving a sequence of mixed integer programming problems. The New England 39 bus system is adopted to illustrate the effectiveness of the proposed method. The systematic applicability of the proposed method to a large scale practical system is also illustrated using a 16173‐bus U.S. Eastern Interconnection system.