International Journal of Electrical and Computer Engineering (IJECE) Vol. 8, No. 1, February 2018, pp. 530~537 ISSN: 2088-8708, DOI: 10.11591/ijece.v8i1.pp530-537  530 Journal homepage: http://iaescore.com/journals/index.php/IJECE Moth Flame Optimization Method for Unified Power Quality Conditioner Allocation M. Laxmidevi Ramanaiah, M. Damodar Reddy Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, S.V. University, India Article Info ABSTRACT Article history: Received Jun 6, 2017 Revised Dec 28, 2017 Accepted Jan 12, 2018 This paper introduces a new optimization method to determine the optimal allocation of Unified Power Quality Conditioner (UPQC) in the distribution systems. UPQC is a versatile Custom Power Device (CPD) to solve problems related to voltage and current by the series and shunt compensator in the distribution systems. The task of UPQC highlighted in this paper is the required load reactive power is provided by both the series and shunt compensators. The UPQC’s steady state compensation capability has given a solution for providing reactive power compensation in large distribution systems. The optimization method adopted is Moth Flame Optimization (MFO). The best location and series compensator voltage are determined using MFO. The voltage injected by the series compensator and reactive power injected by the shunt compensator is incorporated in the load flow method. The effectiveness of the proposed method is validated with standard distribution systems. Keyword: Moth flame optimization Unified power quality conditioner Reactive power compensation distribution systems Copyright © 2018 Institute of Advanced Engineering and Science. All rights reserved. Corresponding Author: M. Laxmidevi Ramanaiah, Departement of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Sri Venkateswara University, Tirupati, Andhra Pradesh-517502, India. Email: m.laxmidevi@yahoo.com 1. INTRODUCTION For productive operation of the electric utility the necessary condition is to operate the system at its maximum efficiency. The losses in the system can be curtailed by minimizing the total flow of reactive power. Reactive power is essential to maintain the quality of supply. Some of the industrial load imposes on the supply large demand for reactive power. Hence reactive power compensators assume a key part in meeting the reactive power needs of the system. The compensators include shunt capacitors and series voltage regulators. Shunt capacitors cannot create variable reactive power constantly. Series voltage regulators drive the source to produce reactive power. Hence, to overcome these disadvantages the static compensators utilizing power electronic devices are employed for effective operation of the system. The static compensators include Distributed Flexible Alternating Current Transmission System (DFACTS). These devices can provide continuously variable reactive power. The most generally used DFACTS devices for reactive power compensation is DSTATCOM [1] and Unified Power Quality Conditioner (UPQC). UPQC [2] is a device which consists of a DVR and DSTATCOM. DVR is a series connected device which handles all the voltage related problems in the system. Unified Power Quality Conditioner [2-4] has the potential to inject the necessary amount of reactive power into the network when the network is in shortage of the reactive power and vice versa. Another advantage of this device is, its output reactive power can be continuously varied. Hence, the shortages of capacitors, which cannot meet the network demands as required, are abolished. The application of UPQC for two bus systems and for sensitive loads to address the problems of power quality is practical as detailed in [5-7].