Using harmonic simulation to evaluate facility-wide harmonic mitigation

Harmonic simulation programs have been used in the power quality field for many years, however, rarely does a user of a program get the opportunity to verify simulation results with actual field measurements. This paper documents a power quality inquiry completed for an industrial customer. The customer had their own 24 kV distribution system which was serving a large harmonic producing load. The resulting harmonic distortion was severe enough to create problems for their production equipment. This distortion was also exacerbated by four switched capacitors on their 24 kV substation bus. A harmonic simulation tool was used to model the industrial facility, analyze the effects of the capacitors, and identify the most effective and economical solution. Field measurements verified the model as well as the effectiveness of the applied solution