Identification of Both Distortion and Imbalance Sources in Electrical Installations: A Comparative Assessment

Abstract

Electric power quality is becoming more critical with time because of the increasing use of electronic devices in all areas of society: in industry, in the household, etc. Many kinds of disturbances can be produced in the grid due to external or internal causes, such as, for example, switching operations. Among them, distortion and imbalance are long-term disturbances, which makes them very dangerous for electric equipment. In addition, the identification of the distortion and/or imbalance sources is quite difficult because they are instantaneously scattered by the grid. This paper presents a study of the algorithms published in the technical literature which identify distortion and imbalance sources in electrical installations and compares the results of applying them to a specific installation constituted by linear and non-linear, balanced and unbalanced loads, and a standard module to inject energy to the grid. Only two algorithms have been found in the review carried out and the results provided by both are presented and discussed. Neither of these algorithms is completely reliable, although one of them is more promising.