POWER FLOWS

Successful power system operation under normal balanced 3-phase steady-state conditions
requires the following:
1. Generation supplies the demand (load) plus losses
2. Bus voltages magnitudes remain close to rated values
3. Generators operate within specified real and reactive power limits
4. Transmission lines and transformers are nor overload.
The power-flow computer program (sometimes called load flow) is the basic tool for
investigating these requirements. Power flow studies are the backbone of power system analysis
and design. They are necessary for planning, operation, economic scheduling and exchange of
power between utilities. This program computes the voltage magnitude and angle at each bus in a
power system under balanced three-phase steady-state conditions. It also computes real and
reactive power flows for all equipment interconnecting the buses, as well as equipment losses.
Both existing power system and proposed changes including new generation and
transmission to meet projected load are of interest.

The Power-Flow Solution

In solving a power flow problem, the system is assumed to be operating under balanced conditions
and a single-phase model is used. Four quantities are associated with each bus. These are
voltage|𝑉|, phase angle , real power P and reactive power Q. The system buses are generally
classified into three types:

➢ Slack Bus One bus, known as slack or swing bus, is taken as reference where the magnitude
and phase angle of the voltage are specified. This bus makes up the difference between the
scheduled loads and generated power that are caused by the losses in the network.

➢ Load Buses At these buses the active and reactive powers are specified. The magnitude
and the phase angle of the bus voltages are unknown. These buses are called P-Q bus

➢ Regulated buses These buses are the regulated buses. they are also known as voltage-
controlled buses. At these buses, the real power and voltage magnitude are specified. The
phase angles of the voltages and the reactive power are to be determined. The limits on the
value of the reactive power are also specified. These buses are called P-V buses.
Power Flow Equations
➢ The Admittance Matrix
Current injections at a bus are analogous to power injections. The student may have already
been introduced to them in the form of current sources at a node. Current injections may be either
positive (into the bus) or negative (out of the bus). Unlike current flowing through a branch (and
thus is a branch quantity), a current injection is a nodal quantity. The admittance matrix, a
fundamental network analysis tool that we shall use heavily, relates current injections at a bus to
the bus voltages. Thus, the admittance matrix relates nodal quantities. We motivate these ideas by
introducing a simple example. We assume that all electrical variables in this document are given
in the per-unit system.
Fig. 1 shows a network represented in a hybrid fashion using one-line diagram representation
for the nodes (buses 1-4) and circuit representation for the branches connecting the nodes and the
branches to ground. The branches connecting the nodes represent lines. The branches to ground
represent any shunt elements at the buses, including the charging capacitance at either end of the
line. All branches are denoted with their admittance values yij for a branch connecting bus i to bus
j and yi for a shunt element at bus i. The current injections at each bus i are denoted by Ii.

Kirchhoff’s Current Law (KCL) requires that each of the current injections be equal to the
sum of the currents flowing out of the bus and into the lines connecting the bus to other buses, or
to the ground. Therefore, recalling Ohm’s Law, I=V/z=Vy, the current injected into bus 1 may be
written as:

To be complete, we may also consider that bus 1 is “connected” to bus 4 through an infinite
impedance, which implies that the corresponding admittance y14 is zero. The advantage to doing
this is that it allows us to consider that bus 1 could be connected to any bus in the network. Then,
we have:

Note that the current contribution of the term containing y14 is zero since y14 is zero.
Rearranging eq. 2, we have:
 Similarly, we may develop the current injections at buses 2, 3, and 4 as:

where we recognize that the admittance of the circuit from bus k to bus i is the same as the
admittance from bus i to bus k, i.e., yki=yik From eqs. (3) and (4), we see that the current injections
are linear functions of the nodal voltages. Therefore, we may write these equations in a more
compact form using matrices according to:

The matrix containing the network admittances in eq. (5) is the admittance matrix, also
known as the Y-bus, and denoted as:

Denoting the element in row i, column j, as Yij, we rewrite eq. (6) as:

where the terms Yij are not admittances but rather elements of the admittance matrix. Therefore,
eq. (5) becomes:

By using eq. (7) and (8), and defining the vectors V and I, we may write eq. (8) in compact form
according to:

We make several observations about the admittance matrix given in eqs. (6) and (7). These
observations hold true for any linear network of any size.
1. The matrix is symmetric, i.e., Yij=Yji.
 2. A diagonal element Yii is obtained as the sum of admittances for all branches connected to
bus i, including the shunt branch, i.e., 𝑌𝑖𝑖 = 𝑦𝑖 + ∑𝑁
𝑘=1,𝑘≠𝑖 𝑦𝑖𝑘 , where we emphasize once

again that yik is non-zero only when there exists a physical connection between buses i and
k.
3. The off-diagonal elements are the negative of the admittances connecting buses i and j, i.e.,
Yij=-yji. These observations enable us to formulate the admittance matrix very quickly from
the network based on visual inspection. The following example will clarify.

Example 1. Consider the network given in Fig. 2, where the numbers indicate admittances.
Line Flows and Losses
After the iterative solution of bus voltages, the nest step is the computation of line flows
and line losses.

Vi Vj
Il yij
Iij Iji
Ii0 Ij0

yi0 yj0

Considering the diagram, the line current Iij, measured at bus i and defined positive in the
direction i → j is given by

𝑰𝒊𝒋 = 𝑰𝒍 + 𝑰𝒊𝟎 = 𝒚𝒊𝒋 (𝑽𝒊 − 𝑽𝒋 ) + 𝒚𝒊𝟎 𝑽𝒊

and

𝑰𝒋𝒊 = −𝑰𝒍 + 𝑰𝒋𝟎 = 𝒚𝒊𝒋 (𝑽𝒋 − 𝑽𝒊 ) + 𝒚𝒋𝟎 𝑽𝒋

The complex power 𝑆𝑖𝑗 from bus I to j and 𝑆𝑗𝑖 from bus j to i is
𝑺𝒊𝒋 = 𝑽𝒊 𝑰𝒊𝒋 ∗ 𝑺𝒋𝒊 = 𝑽𝒋 𝑰𝒋𝒊 ∗

And the power loss of the line I → j is the algebraic sum of the power flows
𝑺𝑳𝒊𝒋 = 𝑺𝒊𝒋 + 𝑺𝒋𝒊

EXAMPLES PROBLEM

0.02 + j 0.04

256.6 MW

0.01 + j 0.03 0.0125 + j 0.025 110.2 MVAR

Slack bus
V1 = 1.05 +j0

138.6 MW 45.2 MVAR

The one-line diagram of simple three-bus power system with generation at bus 1. The magnitude
of voltage at bus 1 is adjusted to 1.05 p.u. The scheduled loads at buses 2 and 3 are marked on the
diagram. Line impedances are marked in u on a 100 MVA base and the line charging susceptances
are neglected.
a.) Using the Gauss-Seidel method, determine the phasor values of the voltages at the load
buses 2 and 3 (P-Q buses) accurate to four decimal places.
b.) Find the slack bus real and reactive power
c.) Determine the line flows and line losses.

PowerWorld Simulator
• Optimal cost https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G1SNTKwbAV4