IJIRST –International Journal for Innovative Research in Science & Technology| Volume 4 | Issue 9 | February 2018 ISSN (online): 2349-6010 All rights reserved by www.ijirst.org 70 Utilization of PV Solar Farm as a STATCOM in a Distribution Networking T. Vignesh M. Gowtham Assistant Professor UG Scholar Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering Jay Shri Ram Group of Institutions Jay Shri Ram Group of Institutions G. Mohana Priya R. Neelavathi UG Scholar UG Scholar Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering Jay Shri Ram Group of Institutions Jay Shri Ram Group of Institutions S. Gowtham Raj UG Scholar Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering Jay Shri Ram Group of Institutions Abstract PV solar farms produce power during the day and are completely idle in the nights. This paper presents utilization of a PV solar farm as a STATCOM in a distribution networking to compensate the voltage level. A reference voltage is fixed in the comparator, then it compares two voltage signals and determines the drop voltage.PIC16F877A microcontroller is used to provide the pulse signal to the IGBT inverter to turn switch on and off based on coding. According to the switch condition the solar energy is used to improve the voltage level. This STATCOM functionality will provide the voltage regulation and improves the stability and transfer limits far beyond minimal incremental benefits. Keywords: Photovoltaic Solar Power System, LCL Filter, Reactive Power Control, IGBT, Microcontroller _______________________________________________________________________________________________________ I. INTRODUCTION FLEXIBLE AC transmission system (FACTS) controllers are being increasingly considered to increase the available power transfer limits/capacity (ATC) of existing transmission lines globally. New research has been reported on the nighttime usage of a photovoltaic (PV) solar farm (when it is normally dormant) where a PV solar farm is utilized as a STATCOM–a FACTS controller, for performing voltage control, thereby improving system performance and increasing grid connectivity of neighboring wind farms. New voltage control has also been proposed on a PV solar farm to act as a STATCOM for improving the power transmission capacity .Although and have proposed voltage-control functionality with PV systems, none have utilized the PV system for power transfer limit improvement. A full converter-based wind turbine generator has recently been provided with FACTS capabilities for improved response during faults and fault ride through capabilities. This paper proposes novel voltage control, together with auxiliary damping control, for a grid-connected PV solar farm inverter to act as a STATCOM both during night and day for increasing transient stability and consequently the Power transmission limit. This technology of utilizing a PV solar farmas a STATCOM is called “PV-STATCOM.” It utilizes the entire solar farm inverter capacity in the night and the remainder inverter capacity after real power generation during the day, both of which remain unused in conventional solar farm operation. Similar STATCOM control functionality can also be implemented in inverter-based wind turbine generators during no-wind or partial wind scenarios for improving the transient stability of the system. Studies are performed for two variants of a single-machine infinite bus (SMIB) system. One SMIB system uses only a single PV solar farm as PV-STATCOM connected at the midpoint whereas the other system uses a combination of a PV-STATCOM and another PV- STATCOM or an inverter-based wind distributed generator (DG) with similar STATCOM functionality. Three-phase fault studies are conducted using the electromagnetic transient software EMTDC/PSCAD, and the improvement in the stable power transmission limit is investigated for different combinations of STATCOM controllers on the solar and wind farm inverters, both during night and day. II. FACTS DEVICES As previously mentioned FACTS devices are power electronic based equipment’s, which are used for the dynamic control of voltage, impedance and phase of high voltage AC transmission lines. There are basically two types of FACTS controllers; Thyristor based controllers and converter based controllers. Thyristor-based FACTS Controllers (including Static Var Compensator or SVC,