Simulation and Evaluation of Solid-State Fault Current Limiter in Electric Distribution System

Abstract

The widespread use of electric loads and natural disasters are the major causes of power quality problems. For instance, the high fault current level leads to electricity interruption and outages. Thus, pruning fault current down to the optimum level is the proper method for power quality improvement. This paper presents a comprehensive performance evaluation using solid-state fault current limiters (SSFCLs) in a distribution system. The proposed SSFCL simulation consists of EMTP modeling and coding by GNU Octave. Fault detection is the essential mechanism that applies the p-q theory. With the proposed SSFCL, the simulation results were shown the performance of fast fault detection and fault current limitation. The simulation results with LC loads show that the proposed SSFCL effectively limits fault currents. Moreover, it can protect the outage and voltage sag at the point of common coupling (PCC) subjected to various types of faults.