Microgrids appear to be a bottom-up market-driven phenomenon that is gaining penetration and market share based on decisions by facility operators and real estate developers, without additional government incentives or regulatory intervention.

The voltage/var problems associated with serving urban areas that import large shares of power during peak load hours have slowly been gaining recognition by the international electric power community. Affected urban areas have often been geographically distant; hence, they may not have been aware of similar problems faced by other areas and thought their situation [...]

Major load areas with high levels of shunt capacitors can present special challenges to system planners and operators. Such highly compensated systems are difficult to operate and are subject to extremely rapid voltage collapse, which can occur with little warning, especially during contingencies. Even worse, a complete voltage collapse and total loss of customer load [...]

There is a global trend toward adding dynamic reactive devices to serve urban load areas. A number of interrelated factors contribute to this increasing use of dynamic reactive devices, such as the following: > Many urban areas are experiencing a growth in load levels. These urban areas also see less generation close to the load [...]

Distributed generation (DG) is being implemented across the nation’s electric grid in ever-expanding ways. During the last few years alone, we have seen major increases in grid-connected photovoltaic (PV) DG. Nearly 1 GW of installed PV capacity is now distributed across the country’s electric grid. The Solar Energy Industries Association reported that grid-installed PV capacity [...]