A review of Static synchronous compensators (STATCOM)

This paper reviews the development of static synchronous compensator (STATCOM), and analylizes the structure of its main circuit, its working principles and control strategies. At last, this paper comes to a conclusion of technical characteristics of STATCOM and outlook of its development trends. Fast acting STATCOM, a representative of FACTS family, is a promising technology which is extensively used as state-of-the-art dynamic shunt compensator for reactive power control in transmission and distribution system. STATCOM controller employs various solid-state converter topologies, magnetics configurations, control algorithms, and switching techniques and so on. The development of STATCOM controller has been well reported in literature with its versatile application in power system. Thus deep investigation of STATCOM from the perspective of its intelligent control and the configuration of STATCOM's main circuit is valuable.