DETERMINATION OF WEAK BUS ORDERING VECTOR IN MULTIMACHINE POWER SYSTEMS FROM VOLTAGE STABILITY VIEWPOINT

ABSTRACT

It is well known that the increase in load demand with a small increase in transmission capacity of a power system leads to voltage instability problems. Deficit of reactive power in the system leads to poor voltage profiles and with increased loading it leads to voltage collapse. The voltage stability condition of the system can be improved by providing reactive power support at certain buses, called the weak buses of the network. Thus determination of the weakest bus and the Weak Bus Ordering Vector (WBOV) assumes great importance. In this paper, a new and simple method is proposed to identify the weakest bus and obtain WBOV in a multimachine power system. The given system is replaced by the equivalent multiport Thevenin network and then the voltage stability limit condition is derived. The weakest bus and WBOV are obtained from an index called, Voltage Change Index. The method is very simple since it requires only one load flow solution for computing the entire WBOV for a given operating condition and it does not require complex multidirectional optimisation. Also, it is applicable to any pattern of load change in the system.