On the Optimization of Damping Enhancement in a Power System with a Hybrid HVDC Link

Hybrid HVDC links incorporate both Line Commutated Converters (LCC) and Voltage Source Converters (VSC) systems, thereby gathering the benefits of both technologies. Supplementary Power Oscillation Damping (POD) controllers can be added to both LCCs and VSCs to help enhance the power system stability against disturbances, such as short circuits. However POD controller tuning can be a delicate process, due to the highly non-linear and complex nature of the involved power system, which might induce adverse interactions leading to a reduced damping. This paper proposes the application of the Simulated Annealing Algorithm (SAA) for tuning the POD controllers parameters, with the purpose of optimizing the performance of POD controllers in the power system. The damping performance is evaluated in case of multiple disturbances in a test power system. The results show the ability of the proposed technique to enhance the performance of the POD controllers under various operating conditions.