Virtual Laboratory for Power Quality Study

AbstractThe paper presents a virtual laboratory for studying power quality events like three-phase voltage dips, which is used by students to learn and test their knowledge about the subject. The virtual laboratory is needed because in real life, in power quality domain, it is very difficult to generate power quality events in order to see the effects or to analyze their characteristics. The virtual laboratory is designed to give the students the possibility to learn first the theoretical aspects of the subject, then to apply the knowledge they accumulate to several signals, in order to get the characteristics of the event and in the end to test their obtained results with signals characteristics. There are two major advantages of using the virtual laboratory: first is that the students can see different events, with different characteristics, and in this way, they understand better the phenomenon; and the second is that a classical laboratory for studying three phase voltage dips is very expensive, the main elements (programmable voltage sources) having a very high cost