A review on reactive power management in electricity markets

Abstract

PurposeThe main purpose behind this work is to explore the methods already proposed in various literatures to overcome the issues associated with VAr management in a competitive environment. Managing reactive power support service in competitive electricity market environment has become an important constituent of ancillary services. The characteristics of VAr generation/absorption do not allow its transmission over a long distance. The issues associated with the localized nature of reactive power must be considered during the valuation, planning, pricing and allocation of VAr producing/absorbing resources. In this review work, the key issues associated with the reactive support and the techniques used to tackle these issues in various utilities across the globe are been discussed in brief. In the literature, numerous renowned authors propose various methods to manage reactive power with various types of structural and operational scenarios. These methods are also discussed briefly in this paper. The experience with VAr management in some matured electricity market is also discussed in this paper.Design/methodology/approachDiscussion of various issues associated with reactive power management and methods/techniques to overcome these, has been carried out in this paper. The methods were proposed in various literatures related to reactive power management by some of the renowned authors and adopted by various electric utilities.FindingsThe review work may be useful for utilities to develop a quick insight on reactive support services to control the voltage profile and also, it may be a useful asset for the researchers working in this area.Originality/valueThe paper is organized with different sections to elaborate the issues and associated methods. This paper is a single piece of work, which addresses reactive power planning, pricing for VAr support, market issues and valuation of VAr utilization.