ISSN (Print) : 0974-6846

Indian Journal of Science and Technology, Vol 9(30), DOI: 10.17485/ijst/2016/v9i30/99009, August 2016 ISSN (Online) : 0974-5645

Optimal Capacitor Placement based Improved

Reliability Assessment of a Distribution System
M. P. Pranitha and K. R. M. Vijaya Chandrakala
Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Amrita School of Engineering, Amrita Vishwa
Vidyapeetham, Amrita University, Amritanagar, Ettimadai, Coimbatore - 641112, Tamil Nadu, India;
pranithaprathapan@gmail.com; krm_vijaya@cb.amrita.edu

Abstract
This paper focuses to reduce the real power losses in a real-time radial distribution system by performing Optimal Capacitor
Placement (OCP) using Genetic Algorithm (GA), thereby enhancing the reliability of the entire system. Reliability analysis
on Amrita power house II, Amrita University, Ettimadai campus, Coimbatore operating at 22kV/415V system is carried out
using ETAP software. System status subjected to different failures as ca se studies are considered. System performance
is analyzed using Adaptive Newton Raphson method. Suggestions for suitable placement of capacitor banks with optimal
size and cost is proposed by performing OCP using GA. Comparison of the results of reliability analysis is done with and
­without capacitor placement. Optimal capacitor placement helps in achieving optimal cost with suitable size and location
of the capacitor bank, which is evident from the report obtained from the ETAP software. Out of load bus and breaker
­failure ­condition, the predominant remark was the considerable increase in real power loss of the overall system. Thus, the
­optimal capacitor placement found to be the most suitable solution for reduction of real power losses in a radial distribution
system. Results of analysis illustrates that the increased value of sustained interruption system ­indices like System Average
Interruption Frequency Index (SAIFI), System Average Interruption Duration Index (SAIDI) and preferably Customer
Average Interruption Duration Index (CAIDI) indicates that the system is highly unreliable ­without capacitors. The results
obtained after capacitor placement indicates reduction in real power losses and thus decrease of reliability indices value.
The expected energy that is not getting supplied to the consumer can be estimated and the cost incurred for loss can be
­reduced with the reliability assessment. Thus long and short term planning could be carried out. Improvements can be
done by including more system reliability assessment indices. Total cost incurred due to unreliable condition of the system
can be found out. This work would allow further extension by introducing FACTS devices for ­reliability ­enhancement.

Keywords: Customer Average Interruption Duration Index, Genetic Algorithm, Optimal Capacitor Placement Relibaility
Indices, Radial Distribution System, Reliability Assessment

1.  Introduction unavailability, the expected failure frequency and dura-

Reliability has got great significance in power system.
As far as power system is concerned, the customer sat-
isfaction is measured on the basis of reliability indices.
It is necessary to supply high quality and reliable electric
power at reasonable price to the customers. The market
strategy of the power supply and the demand is nowa-
days ahead towards deregulation which makes it more
oriented towards introducing reliability analysis. The
measurement of power system reliability includes the
tion, and the expected magnitude of adverse effect on
customer services. Collection of system component reli-
ability data is therefore a fundamental task in reliability
evaluation1.
Demand is rising all the time and it is difficult for the
modern society to move ahead without access to electric-
ity. As the volume of power transmitted and distributed
increases, the requirements for high quality and reliable
supply becomes necessary. At the same time, rising costs
and growing environmental concerns make the process

*Author for correspondence

 Optimal Capacitor Placement based Improved Reliability Assessment of a Distribution System
of building new power transmission and distribution
lines increasingly complicated and time-consuming.
Making existing lines as well as new ones more efficient
and economical, then becomes a compelling alterna-
tive. Therefore, the reliability issues are to be seriously
considered for the analysis and planning the power sys-
tem. Power system reliability falls under the category
of system adequacy and system security. System ade-
quacy evaluation technique is used in security domain to
evaluate security based reliability. This is also helpful in
evaluating the risk based security limits. System security
is usually associated with system planning and operation.
Thus, quality of electric supply consists of reliability as
one of its important aspect. Therefore reliability as such
is based on the probability and consequence. Initially,
the researches focused towards the reliability aspect of
transmission system. Further, the reliability studies were
towards the generation and distribution side of the power
network. Minimal cut-set approach for failure modes and
its effects were generally adopted for reliability studies
towards transmission and distribution side of the power
network1. Based on the Load Supplying Capability (LSC)
and load forecast, failure determination of transmission
line is carried out. Deterministic Indices like system
Load Supplying Capability (LSC), Generation Utilization
Factor, Transmission Reserve Factor and Reliable
Transmission Capacity along with Probabilistic Indices
like Loss of Load Probability (LOLP) and Loss of Load
Expectations (LOLE) are considered for reliability evalu-
ation under transmission system2-7. Reliability criterion
mainly focuses on the concepts of probability of failure
and expected frequency of failure. Even, the concept of
reliability enhancement using Thyristor Controlled Series
Capacitor (TCSC) is introduced with the development of
FACTS technologies. Multi module TCSC will be operated
in both Module level and Common level protection mode
to ensure reliability. State space model for module created
based on Markov Process, is evaluated based on system
and delivery point indices8-13. But, depending on the
load point of view the reliability analysis plays major role
towards the distribution network. This paper deals with
the reliability analysis of a real-time radial distribution
system. The system considered is Amrita’s power house
II, Amrita University, Ettimadai campus, Coimbatore
operating at 22kV/415V. The reliability analysis on the
system is analyzed using ETAP software14. Reliability
assessment under different equipment failure condition
is taken into account. Out of which, the critical failure is
2 Vol 9 (30) | August 2016 | www.indjst.org
identified taking into account the power factor variation
on the buses. Optimal capacitor placement (OCP)15-18 is
carried out using Genetic Algorithm (GA) and optimal
location is identified which helps the power factor of the
buses to be corrected nearer to unity, the total cost of the
system is optimized and subsequently reliability indices
is improved. The work is discussed in the following sec-
tions. Section I introduces the work, Section II deals with
the reliability assessment and its indices in distribution
system, Section III discusses the test system, Section IV
handles the performance of the test system under differ-
ent unconditional scenarios of the equipment in terms
of reliability indices, Section V deals with the Optimal
Capacitor Placement (OCP) using Genetic Algorithm
(GA) and Section VI concludes the work.
2. Reliability Assessment and its
Indices in Distribution System
2.1 Necessity and Importance of Reliability
Assessment
Managing bulk system reliability for a utility is essential.
Measurement of actual system reliability provides feedback
to the planners on the performance of executed plans. It
gives feedback to operation personnel on reliability effects of
operating and maintenance practices. Reliability Assessment
helps in system planning for long and short terms. System
reliability can be grouped into the two distinct aspects i.e. in
terms of system security and system adequacy.
System security involves the ability of the system to
respond to disturbances and remain in secure operation
meeting the customer demand. In order to maintain the
desired level of adequacy and to ensure against excessive
shortages, additional reserve must be maintained. And,
system adequacy relates the existence of sufficient genera-
tion, transmission and distribution facilities within the
system to satisfy the customer load demand. It is associ-
ated with the system steady state conditions and system
planning for long and short terms. In case of adequacy
and security, the higher the reserve margin the higher the
system reliability but at a substantial economic cost.
2.2 Reliability Indices in a Distribution
Network
The reliability of a network could be judged on the basis
of reliability indices. Sustained Interruption System
Indian Journal of Science and Technology
 M. P. Pranitha and K. R. M. Vijaya Chandrakala

r­ eliability indices are considered over the distribution

side of the power network. Namely; System Average
Interruption Frequency Index (SAIFI), System Average
Interruption Duration Index (SAIDI), Customer Average
Interruption Duration Index (CAIDI), Average Service
Availability Index (ASAI), Average Service Unavailability
Index (ASUI), Expected Energy Not Supplied (EENS) and
Average Energy Not Supplied (AENS)12,13. System Average
Interruption Frequency Index (SAIFI) implies how often
an average customer experiences sustained interruption
over a predefined time expressed as f/customer year.

 (1)
Usually, SAIFI is calculated with the statistics based on
number of customers. Increased value of system average
interruption frequency index indicates high reliability.
System Average Interruption Duration Index (SAIDI)
indicates the total duration of interruption for the aver-
Figure 1.  Single line diagram of Amrita’s Power house-II,
age customer experiences sustained interruption over a
Amrita University, Ettimadai campus, Coimbatore.
predefined time expressed as f/customer year.

 (2) Generator 1 and Generator 2 are diesel generators which

And, Customer Average Interruption Duration Index
(CAIDI) represents average time required to restore the
service expressed in hr/customer interruption.
 (3)
CAIDI is the prime most reliability index which justi-
fies the reliability of the system in terms of customer point
of view in a distribution network. Therefore, while per-
forming the reliability indices CAIDI and the total real
power losses of the system under different equipment fail-
ure is analyzed in the work.
3. Amrita Distribution System
Operating at 22kV/415V
As a test system, Amrita’s Power House-II, Amrita
University, Ettimadai campus, Coimbatore single line
diagram/electrical layout is considered which is shown in
Figure 1. The system is developed using ETAP software.
A 22kV grid is supplying power to five load buses.
The system has lighting loads and transformers which are
considered as lumped loads with a power factor of 0.8.
DC motor load is considered as static load. Oil Natural
Air Natural (ONAN) transformers are used. The sys-
tem is interconnected via XLPE three cored Aluminium
(Al) cables of 185mm2, 300mm2 and 400mm2 are used.
power the campus when there is power cut from the 22kV
Grid system and generally acts as back up. Load buses are
connected by means of bus couplers. Bus couplers will be
operated in a sequence, such that the supply satisfies the
demand. The analysis is carried out on a 22kV grid system
feeding the Amrita University by disconnecting the diesel
generators.
4. Reliability Analysis and
Discussions
Load flow analysis of the system is carried out using ETAP
software. Reliability assessment for the system is done under
different cases like normal condition and load bus failure,
breaker failure at each load bus. Probable failure and repair
rate as per the standards of IEEE is tabulated in Table 1.
Components used for protection, bus and transform-
ers are assumed to have lower failure and repair rates.
Testing the system shown in Figure 1 using ETAP soft-
ware/Reliability Assessment mode provided CAIDI of
24.53 (hr/customer interruption) with total system real
power losses of (80 kW).
4.1  Load Bus Failure
In this case, the supply from 22kV grid will feed all the five
load buses i.e. Bus 6, Bus 7, Bus 8, Bus 9 and Bus 12 with

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 Optimal Capacitor Placement based Improved Reliability Assessment of a Distribution System

Table 1.  Probable Failure and Repair Rates for Each Table 2.  System Data
Component COMPONENTS RATINGS BUS TOTAL
Probable Failure Probable Repair Power Grid 22kV Bus 1 1
Component
Rate (failure/yr) Rate (repair/yr) 500
Switch 0.003 43.8 kVA,22kV/433 Bus 3
Transformer V
Fuse 0.003 43.8
(ONAN, star- 500 kVA,
Cable 0.05 1095 Bus 3 3
delta) 22kV/433 V
Generator 0.032 43.8 250 kVA,
Bus 3
Transformer 0.015 43.8 22kV/433 V
0.467 MVA Bus 6
Lumped load 0.02 175.2 Lumped loads 0.438 MVA Bus 7
Bus 0.001 4380 (lighting loads,
0.646 MVA Bus 8 5
Static load 0.02 175.2 motor loads,
transformers) 0.078 MVA Bus 9
0.415 MVA Bus 12
a total load capacity of 1.814 MVA. CAIDI as reliability Static load
0.041 MVA Bus 7 1
index under distribution network is used for justifying (DC motor)
the reliability status of the system is shown in Table 2. 890 mtrs
b/w bus 1 &
In this study, load buses i.e. Bus 6, Bus 7, Bus 8, Bus 9 bus 2
and Bus 12 are made out of service individually and the b/w bus 1 &
25 mtrs
bus 2
reliability assessment is done. During the load bus failure
b/w bus 2 &
the real power losses increases. The real power losses on 1080 mtrs
bus 3
performing the load flow analysis using adaptive Newton b/w bus 3 &
Raphson (NR) method under subsequent bus failures 20 mtrs
bus 7
with CAIDI is computed and shown in Figure 2. Since the b/w bus 3 &
Cable 15 mtrs 8
load buses are connected through bus coupler, the fail- bus 6
ure of each bus will have slight impact on others. From b/w bus 3 &
20 mtrs
the Figure 2, Bus 7 failure caused the impact on the total bus 8
system with increased value of CAIDI to be 28.07 (hr/cus- b/w sync
25 mtrs panel &
tomer interruption) and higher overall system real power
bus 4
losses of 100kW which indicates the system to be highly
b/w sync
unreliable when compared to other load buses. 25 mtrs panel &
bus 5
4.2  Breaker Failure
Circuit breakers are kept at the lines connecting the load
bus. Each breaker is made open individually and reliabil-
ity indices are found out. CAIDI during breaker failure is
plotted in Figure 3. Breaker failures at bus 6 have highest
CAIDI of 27.7 (hr/customer interruption) and real power
losses (153kW) when compared to other bus impacts.
Therefore, identified unreliable condition during breaker
failure is predominant at bus 6.
When compared with the normal condition CAIDI
during bus 7 failure and breaker failure at bus 6 have higher
value of indices and real power flow losses. It indicates that
the system is highly unreliable during the above cases.
The suggested solution for increasing reliability of the Figure 2.  Customer Average Interruption Duration
radial distribution system is by locating the capacitors in Index (CAIDI) and real power losses under load bus failure
the load buses which would help the reliability in terms condition.

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Figure 3.  Customer Average Interruption Duration
indices (CAIDI) and real power losses under breaker failure
condition.
of reduced CAIDI and real power losses of the system.
Therefore, optimal capacitor placement15 under the iden-
tified cases is proposed.
5. Optimal Capacitor Placement
for an Amrita Distribution
System Operating at
22kV/415V
From the section IV, the most unreliable case is found
to be the bus 7 failure and breaker failure at bus 6 across
the load buses. Optimal Capacitor Placement (OCP) is
located by Genetic Algorithm (GA) technique. Objective
function of capacitor placement across the load buses is to
locate the buses for placing minimum number of capaci-
tors to improve the reliability and real power losses of
the Amrita distribution system. Therefore, the objective
function of OCP is to minimize the cost including fixed
capacitor installation cost, capacitor purchase cost, capac-
itor bank operating cost and ccost of real power loss16-18.
The objective function is as shown below.
 (4)
Where,
Nbus – Number of candidate buses; xi – 0 or 1 possible,
depending on availability; C0i – Installation cost; C1i – Per
kvar cost of capacitor bank; Qci – Capacitor bank size in
kvar; Bi – number of capacitor banks; C2i – Operating cost
of per bank, per year; T – Planning period in years; C2 –
Cost of each kWh loss; l – load levels ; Tl – Time duration in
hours of load level l; P1L – Total system loss at load level l14.
Vol 9 (30) | August 2016 | www.indjst.org
M. P. Pranitha and K. R. M. Vijaya Chandrakala
As per the first case study, OCP under bus 7 failure
is carried out using ETAP software. Figure 4, shows the
OCP results under bus 7 failure. As per Figure 4 results,
the OCP using GA technique suggested the no. of capaci-
tor banks required to improve the reliability of the system
during the bus 7 failure comprises of 1000 kVAR capaci-
tor of 25 banks distributed among the different buses.
CAIDI after capacitor placement due to bus 7 fail-
ure is shown in Figure 5. And, real power loss reduction
after capacitor placement during bus 7 failure is shown
in Figure 6. From Figure 5 and Figure 6, it shows that
after OCP and placing the 1000 kVAR capacity capaci-
tor distributed at all buses, the CAIDI value is reduced
from 28.07 (hr/customer interruption) to 27.7 (hr/cus-
tomer interruption) and the total system real power
losses is reduced from 100 kW to 80.3 kW respectively.
With proper choice of capacitor at load buses reflects the
system with improved reliability. As per the second case
study, OCP under breaker failure at bus 6 is carried out
using ETAP software. Figure 7, shows the OCP results
under breaker failure at bus 6.
During the breaker failure at bus 6 as shown in Figure
7, the OCP results suggest 41 capacitor banks of 1680
kVAR capacity distributed at different buses. CAIDI after
capacitor placement due to breaker at bus 6 failure is
shown in Figure 8.
And, real power loss reduction after capacitor place-
ment during breaker failure at bus 6 is shown in Figure 9.
From Figure 8 and Figure 9, it shows that after OCP and
placing the 1680 kVAR capacity capacitor distributed at
Figure 4.  OCP results at the buses of the Amrita distribution
system using ETAP software under bus 7 failure.
Indian Journal of Science and Technology 5
 Optimal Capacitor Placement based Improved Reliability Assessment of a Distribution System

Figure 5.  CAIDI value of the Amrita distribution system

after OCP using ETAP software under Bus 7 failure.

Figure 7.  OCP results at the buses of the Amrita distribution

system using ETAP software under breaker failure at bus 6.

Figure 6.  Real power losses at Amrita distribution system

after OCP using ETAP software under Bus 7 failure. Figure 8.  CAIDI value of the Amrita distribution system
after OCP using ETAP software under breaker failure at
all buses, the CAIDI value is reduced from 27.7 (hr/cus- bus 6.
tomer interruption) to 19.79 (hr/customer interruption)
and the total system real power losses is reduced from
153 kW to 135.5 kW respectively. By placing the optimal
no. of capacitors in the Amrita distribution system dur-
ing the breaker failure at bus 6 has considerably improved
the reliability of the system and concurrently reduced the
total system real power losses.

6.  Conclusion
Improved planning for a real-time radial distribution sys-
tem of Amrita Power House II operating at 22kV/415V is
suggested. The system is analyzed using ETAP software/
Reliability Assessment mode. The system was subjected
to two case studies. Firstly, load buses were made to fail Figure 9.  Real power losses at Amrita distribution system
one by one and correspondingly reliability index CAIDI after OCP using ETAP software under breaker failure at
and total system real power loss were studied. Secondly, bus 6.

6 Vol 9 (30) | August 2016 | www.indjst.org Indian Journal of Science and Technology

breaker failure at all the load buses were concurrently
removed one after the other and CAIDI with total real
power loss of the system were noted. The significant
increase in the CAIDI and real power losses due to bus
7 failure and breaker failure at bus 6 would make the
system highly unreliable. Therefore, Optimal Capacitor
Placement (OCP) was suggested using Genetic Algorithm
(GA) technique. With optimal choice on the no. of capac-
itors to be installed in the distribution system under the
contingencies of bus 7 failure and breaker failure at bus 6
lead to reduced CAIDI value and total system real power
losses. Therefore, the reliability of the Amrita distribution
system is improved.
7.  Appendix
Amrita’s power house II system data description is tabu-
lated below in Table 2.
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