Meta-heuristics algorithms for optimization of gains for dynamic voltage restorers to improve power quality and dynamics

This article discusses metaheuristic algorithms for optimizing controller gains for dynamic voltage restorers (DVRs) that use an impedance control strategy to compensate for unbalance in source voltages, voltage harmonics, and sag/swell in source voltages. The gains of the proportional-integral (PI) controllers become critical for proper DVR load voltage extraction. Various techniques for optimization, such as whale optimization technique, gray wolf optimization technique, particle swarm optimization technique, and ant lion optimization technique, are used to obtain DC and AC PI controller gains for DVR. The impedance control strategy employs simple calculations to determine the resistance and reactance of a polluted source voltage, without the use of frame conversions as in synchronous reference theory, instantaneous reference power theory, and so on. The quick calculations of the impedance control scheme improve the power quality and dynamics. The Metaheuristic algorithms are used to calculate the number of iterations required to achieve the best possible controller gains, which further helps to improve power quality and dynamics. Among these optimization techniques, the antlion optimization technique provides fast convergence and the best possible controller gain values to improve the dynamics of the dc-link voltage of voltage source converter and terminal voltage, thereby improving power quality. The proposed antlion optimization technique-based DVR model is simulated in MATLAB R2019, and the results are validated with RT-LAB.