Enhancement of Power Quality Using Active Power Filters

This paper introduces the terminology and various issues related to ‗power quality'. The interest in power quality is explained in the context of a number of much wider developments in power engineering: deregulation of the electricity industry, increased customer-demands, and the integration of renewable energy sources. After an introduction of the different terminology two power quality disturbances are discussed in detail: voltage dips and harmonic distortion. For each of these two disturbances, a number of other issues are briefly discussed, which are characterization, origin, mitigation, and the need for future research. Shunt, hybrid and series active power filters are described showing their compensation characteristics and principles of operation. Different power circuits topologies and control scheme for each type of active power filter are analyzed.