Lab Practice # 3

OBJECT: To improve power factor by adding a capacitor parallel with the load Theory:
The ratio between true power and apparent power is called the power factor. Power factor can be an important aspect to consider in an AC circuit; because any power factor less than 1 means that the circuit's wiring has to carry more current than what would be necessary with zero reactance in the circuit to deliver the same amount of (true) power to the resistive load. Poor power factor can be corrected, paradoxically, by adding another load to the circuit drawing an equal and opposite amount of reactive power, to cancel out the effects of the load's inductive reactance. Inductive reactance can only be canceled by capacitive reactance, so we have to add a capacitor in parallel to circuit as the additional load. The method of connecting a capacitor in parallel with an inductive load is known as power factor correction. The effect of the capacitor is to increase the power factor of the source that delivers power to the load. Also, the source apparent power Ss decreases.

Procedure:
First of all insert two buses on new case. Select insert bus from the main menu or select the bus button on the insert palette. This prepares the simulator to insert a bus. Click on the on-line background at the location where we want to place the new bus. This invokes the bus option dialog. Use the bus option dialog box to specify the name, size, orientation, area, zone, and nominal voltage of the bus as well as load and shunt components connected to it. Click OK on the bus option dialog box to finish creating the bus and to close the dialog box. To add a new generator to the case, select Network > Generator from the Individual Insert ribbon group on the Draw ribbon tab. Then, place the cursor on the bus 1 to attach the generator, and click with the left mouse button. This calls up the Generator Dialog. Set the parameters as per required. To add a new transmission line to the case, first select Network > Transmission Line from the Individual Insert ribbon group on the Draw ribbon tab. Then place the cursor on the first bus for the transmission line (the from bus) and click the left mouse button. Add more segments to the line by moving the cursor and clicking with the left mouse button. To complete adding a new line, place the cursor on the second bus for the line and double-click with the left mouse button. To add a new load to the case, select Network > Load from Individual Insert ribbon group on the Draw ribbon tab. Then, select the Load bus to attach the load with the left mouse button. This calls up the Load Dialog. The bus number is automatically determined from the bus to which we attached the load. Simulator offers two options for adding switched shunt fields to a oneline in Edit Mode. the easier approach is to choose Field > Switched Shunt Field from the Individual Insert ribbon group on the Draw ribbon tab, and then select the switched shunt to which we want to add the field. Final system looks similar to the system shown in Figure 3.1.

Figure (3.1)

Next, we need to switch back to Run Mode to animate the new system developed in fig 3.1. Click on the Run Mode button, select the Tools on the ribbon and then click the green and black button above Solve to start the simulation. The speed and size of the green arrows are proportional to the real power supplied to the load bus, and the blue arrows are proportional to the reactive power. Here reactive compensation can be supplied in discrete 20-kVar steps by clicking on the arrows in the capacitors kvar field, and the load can be varied by clicking on the arrows in the load field. We notice that increasing the reactive compensation decreases both the reactive power flow on the supply line and the kVA power supplied by the generator; the real power flow is unchanged. The source current Is = Ss / V also decreases. When line impedance between the source and load is included, the decrease in source current results in lower line losses and lower line-voltage drops. The end result of power factor correction is improved efficiency and improved voltage regulation.