Mitigation of Voltage Unbalance in Low Voltage Distribution Network with High Level of Photovoltaic System

Abstract

Numbers of incentives were offered by Malaysian government to encourage the growth of renewable energy in meeting the Tenth Malaysian Plan (from 2011 to 2015) target of 98 MW which contributes 5.5% of the total electricity generation. It becomes increasingly important to understand the technical challenges facing high penetration of distributed generation (DG), especially for photovoltaic (PV) system. With many larger PV installations in low voltage distribution networks (LVDN) coming soon, several issues may arise such as voltage unbalance, voltage regulation, voltage rise, cable and transformer thermal limits and network losses inLVDN. This paper presents a technique to mitigate the voltage unbalance in LVDN with a high penetration of PV system by using a controllable Energy Storage Unit (ESU). Investigations are carried out in the experimental Small-Scaled Energy Zone (SSEZ).