Intelligent GA-PID Control of STATCOM for Voltage Sag Mitigation in Transmission Lines

Abstract

The paper presents an intelligent control approach for a Static Synchronous Compensator (STATCOM) using a Genetic Algorithm-optimized Proportional-Integral-Derivative (GA-PID) controller to mitigate voltage sags in power transmission systems. This shunt-connected device is part of the FACTS family and dynamically injects reactive power compensation through the Voltage Source Converter to hold stable voltage magnitudes. Conventional PID controllers have shortcomings due to non-productive manual tuning and poor transient response performance. A Genetic Algorithm optimization approach has been implemented to automatically select optimum PID parameters for the improvement of control accuracy with increased system response speed. Performance of both GA-PID and traditional PID controllers is analyzed under voltage sag situations through MATLAB/Simulink simulations. The STATCOM controlled by GA-PID shows better performance with a reduced overshoot of 4.17%, a faster rise time of 0.0000504 s, and the shortest settling time of 0.000538 s. Thus, it has been established that these parameters significantly improve transient and steady-state performances by reducing the steady-state error, which in turn enhances voltage stability and power quality. The adaptive control reduces harmonic distortion and maintains the best performance of the system even in the presence of disturbances. This has proven that the integration of Genetic Algorithm optimization and PID control provides a robust, adaptive, efficient strategy to improve the performance of STATCOM, hence improving voltage regulation, the reliability of power, and efficiency for modern high-voltage transmission systems.