Newton-Raphson Algorithm as a Power Utility Tool for Network Stability

Nigerian power utility companies particularly the distribution and generation aspects were recently in the process of national power reform converted from public to private service by privatization. Prior to these development, power utility companies’ performance is low due to poor operational style that leads to inadequate revenue generation. Thus, the task before the privatized companies includes autonomy, high reliability operation and brake-even management. To achieve these goal, frequent outages and system collapses must be minimized. One of the methods of achieving this is using power flow to improve the reliability of power system which will subsequently improve other lacking factors. A developed software for Newton-Raphson power flow was tested with a known solution network and the results obtained are accurate and reliable. Therefore, this paper presents an application of this software on real-time transmission network. Nigerian 330kV transmission grid is considered as case study. The power flow analysis of this grid was carried out and the network operational parameters were obtained. These results are stated and carefully analyzed. In practice, power utility distribution network of medium voltage of 11kV feeder was also tested with this NR-Software in ascertaining network reliability and in the course of adding public transformers to utility feeder network