Optimal Placement and Sizing of FACTS Devices for Loadability Enhancement in Deregulated Power Systems

This paper presents the use of Flexible AC Transmission Systems (FACTS) for improving loadability of the system in deregulated electric power system.The optimallocation and parameter settingsof two types of FACTS devices have been investigated in this study. The Static Synchronous Series Compensator (SSSC) and Thyristor Controlled Series Compensation (TCSC) as two FACTS devices are considered in this paper. FACTS devicesare applied to maximize the system loadability subjectto the transmission line capacity limits. Harmony Search Algorithm (HSA) as a novel heuristic algorithm is applied to find the proper size and location of FACTS devices.The results of the HSA are compared with those obtained using the Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) as the method of optimization to show the effectiveness of the proposed method in finding the best location and size of these devices. The proposed approach istested on IEEE 14bus test systems. The results show that the optimal location and proper parameters selection of the FACTS devices effectively enhance thepower transmission system loadability.