Employment of power transfer distribution factor for the optimal placement of FACTS devices

This paper presents a method for determination of the optimal placement and sizing of FACTS device. The objective considered is to maximize the available transfer capability (ATC) of heavy transaction zones. Generally, ATC calculation is recursive and consequently time consuming. In this paper the power transfer distribution factor (PTDF) is used for fast calculation of the ATC. The method is modified to include losses and subsequently, the FACTS placement problem is solved using a genetic algorithm to obtain the least loss at the maximum ATC. For the purpose of comparison the ATC is also calculated using the repeated power flows method. This paper shows that the PTDF method is both computational more efficient and provides a sufficient degree of solution accuracy.