Mitigation of voltage sags in distribution line system using static VAR compensator and static synchronous compensator

Abstract Voltage sag is one of the power quality disturbances most frequently by customers because it can cause economic loss for the customers especially industries and commercial customers. The main source of voltage sags are faults in transmission and distribution beside two others namely motor large starting and transformer energizing, both the voltage sags have less effect on the equipment. Voltage sags can cause degradation performance of the equipment, and it depends on the magnitude and the duration. The voltage sags that occur in the power system can be compensated with installed Static VAR compensator (SVC) and Static synchronous compensator (STATCOM) in the distribution system bus. The purpose of the study is to compare both types of the device used to mitigate voltage sags in simulation using Alternative transient program (ATP) software. The voltage sag results from the short circuit faults. The method proposes the installation of the two compensator devices alternatively at one of the IEEE thirteen busses systems. The result shows the STATCOM is better than the SVC to handle mitigation of voltage sags compared with the SVC.