Optimal location of STATCOM in multimachine power system for increasing loadability by Cuckoo Search algorithm

•This paper proposes Cuckoo Search algorithm for optimal designing of STATCOM.•The best location of STATCOM is determined via PV curves.•The design problem of STATCOM is formulated as an optimization problem.•The superiority of the CS algorithm is compared with GA and open loop one.•The effectiveness of the proposed controller in increasing loadability is confirmed.

A new metaheuristic method, the Cuckoo Search (CS) algorithm, based on the life of a bird family is proposed in this paper for optimal design of static synchronous compensator (STATCOM) in a multimachine environment. PV curves are illustrated to determine the best location of STATCOM. The STATCOM parameter tuning problem is converted to an optimization problem which is solved by CS Algorithm. The performance of the proposed CS based STATCOM (CSSTATCOM) is compared with Genetic Algorithm (GA) based STATCOM (GASTATCOM) and open loop STATCOM under various operating conditions and disturbances. The superiority of the proposed technique in damping oscillations and enhancing voltage profiles is confirmed through eigenvalues and time domain simulation results over the GA and open loop one.