TURBINE-GENERATOR SHAFT TORSIONALS
9-36
responsible for the negative electrical damping due to torsional interaction (see equation 9.115),
which can occur in systems with or without series compensation.
In the state-space approach described earlier both the torsional interaction effect and the self-
excitation effect are accounted for simultaneously.
Control of Subsynchronous Oscillation Problems
A number of control measures are available for mitigating the subsynchronous oscillation
problems arising from series capacitor compensation of transmission lines. None of these control
measures, applied singly, can however be considered to be a complete solution to the problems.
Some of these are effective only in specific applications. More than one measure may be needed
in any given situation.
From the analysis presented earlier it is evident that the most direct way of eliminating most of
the shaft torsional problems would be to provide for large mechanical damping of the shaft
system. However, there does not appear to be any practical means of achieving this at the present
time.
The theory and principle of operation of some of the control measures will now be described [26
- 30]. Although recent control measures employing power electronics are not included here, the
principles of operation are similar.
Static blocking filter
This is a multi-element blocking filter placed in series with the high-voltage winding of the
generator step-up transformer at the neutral end. Each element is a high Q parallel LC circuit
tuned to block electrical current at a frequency which coincides with the complement of a
torsional natural frequency, with negligible increase in impedance to 60 Hz current. The
combination of the filter impedance and the transmission impedance introduces parallel
resonances at the torsional complementary frequencies and shifts system series resonance points
to frequencies that cannot damage the machine.
The static filter provides control of transient torque and torsional interaction effects. Since each
filter is tuned to protect an individual unit, the effect of system changes is minimal. The filters’
effectiveness is reduced when detuned due to normal temperature variations, capacitor failure,
and changes in system frequency during a disturbance. This may be counteracted by augmenting
the natural shaft damping by a supplementary excitation control. This device provides damping
by injecting into the voltage regulator of a high initial response excitation system a properly
phased sinusoidal signal derived from rotor motion. Also, it may be necessary to increase the
basic insulation level of the generator step-up transformer.
Field tests have demonstrated the effectiveness of the static filter.
Line filter
The flow of subsynchronous current at a specific frequency can be blocked by connecting an
appropriately sized reactor in parallel with an existing series capacitor. The filter thus formed
will have a higher net capacitive reactance at 60 Hz than the original series capacitor and a lower
allowable line current. The original capacitive reactance can be restored by connecting additional
capacitors in parallel.