In this study, a heuristics-based optimisation methodology for a day-ahead unit commitment (UC) model in microgrids is proposed. The model aims to schedule the power among the different microgrid units while minimising the operating costs together with the CO₂ emissions produced. A storage device is added where the charge and discharge schedule is calculated according to both objectives. In addition, as a part of the demand side participation strategy, a charging schedule was determined for the electric vehicles (EV) in order to increase the system security and further reduce the costs and emissions. A congestion management approach is also introduced, which eliminates congestions by effective unit scheduling according to congestion signals provided by the distribution system operators. The complete day-ahead time horizon is divided in 96 time steps (each with a 15 min time span), which makes the UC problem more complicated. The studied system includes renewable energy resources, a storage unit, two microturbines, a fuel cell and EVs. The results demonstrate that the proposed model is robust and is able to reduce the microgrid operating costs and emissions by optimal scheduling of the microgrid units, and is able to take into account local congestion problems.

This study proposes a new concept of transmission line differential protection based on an alternative alpha plane of incremental complex power, where the restraint characteristic is simply defined as its left-half-plane, so that no settings are required to define it. As the incremental complex power is evaluated per phase, the proposed algorithm is inherently phase segregated, not requiring additional faulted phase selection logics. A simple harmonic restraint strategy along with an external fault detection logic provides security for external faults with current transformer saturation. Aiming to evaluate the performance of the proposed algorithm, a wide variety of fault scenarios are simulated for a 500 kV transmission line 200 km long using the Alternative Transients Program. The obtained results reveal the proposed algorithm provides a fast and reliable line protection, being robust against variations in fault parameters, sources strength and loading conditions, as well as power swing situations and line energisation manoeuvres. Accordingly, one can suppose the proposed algorithm might be successfully used in numerical transmission line relaying.

Grounding of power substations is to provide safety for personnel during normal and fault-to-ground conditions by limiting step and touch potentials, to dissipate lightning strokes and to stabilise voltage during transient conditions. One important goal of this study is to present simplified approaches for the earth surface potentials and ground potential rise (GPR) of substation grounding in case of uniform and non-uniform soils. The equalisation of the current density and then decreasing of GPR is achieved. The Infinite Series Potential Method is used to calculate the GPR and the earth surface potentials with accurate results for the grids buried in uniform and non-uniform soil structures. The voltage profiles have been designed in three-dimensional to make the selection of suitable earthing system easier. An experimental model is used for the verification of the obtained results.

The increasing penetration of wind power makes it a critical problem to maintain the security and economy in power system operations. This study proposes a security constrained economic dispatch (SCED) strategy that considers optimising system state selection and spinning reserve allocation. The system state selection is judged by the criterion of occurrence probability. Considering the impacts of wind power integration on the outage probability of system component, the over-current protection outage model and voltage protection outage model are employed to calculate the operational outage probabilities of transmission lines and generators, respectively. The fast sorting technique is adopted to select all system states with higher-occurrence probability than the system security threshold. Besides the traditional constraints on system demand and regulation range, the spinning reserve allocation additionally obeys the transmission constraints in the selected states to avoid transmission congestion in contingency situations. Benders decomposition is utilised to partition the SCED problem into the active power dispatch sub-problem and the optimal reserve allocation sub-problem for tractability. A numerical comparison with the traditional N−1 security assessment SCED is given to validate security and economic improvement of the proposed method.

With the development of active distribution networks, new challenges such as overvoltage and power loss become critical. The reactive power optimisation serves as a voltage control measure to minimise the total transmission loss by coordinating the continuous and discrete reactive power compensators while guaranteeing the specific physical and operating constraints. To address the daily operating times of discrete control variables, the dynamic reactive power optimisation (DRPO) is set up to minimise total energy loss over several time periods when considering the inter-temporal constraints. However, DRPO is in fact a large-scale mixed integer non-linear non-convex programming that is difficult to solve. Therefore, second-order cones are employed to relax the non-convex power flow equations to obtain a mixed integer second order cone programming model. Furthermore, a sensitivity-based relaxation and decomposition method is proposed to further improve the computational performance. Solution quality and computational performance are compared with traditional methods on IEEE-33, 123 and 615-bus systems as well as two real-world distribution networks in China. The Results demonstrate that the fast performance and effectiveness of the proposed technique.

In this study, a model of one-phase transformers with saturation effects, suitable for low- and mid-frequency electromagnetic transient simulations using the numerical Laplace transform is presented. Substitution and superposition theorems are invoked to convert the saturation non-linear condition of the transformer into a series of time-sequential switching manoeuvres. Model advantage is that frequency dependence of electrical parameters is naturally taken into account and, together with the capability of including non-linear phenomena, leads to a valuable tool to validate time-domain models based on convolutions.

Rapid restoration of power systems is vitally important following an outage; however, existing optimal objectives and models to start up all the generators may cause problems where by some generators are ramping while others are waiting shown in the calculation results. To address this problem considering the generator regulation characteristics, a variable-constrained maximum-value minimisation model is proposed in this study to describe the practical problem. By introducing the time variable t, the variable-constrained optimisation problem is converted to a constrained optimal power flow problem, which can be solved using common optimisation approaches. Applying the proposed model and method, the optimisation method is discussed considering the characteristics of generators during power system black start. Numerical results show that the algorithm is effective and can significantly reduce the restoration time. The algorithm described here is applied to the Guangdong power grid self-healing decision-making system.

Transient stability constrained optimal power flow (TSCOPF) is a non-linear optimisation problem used to perform economic dispatches while ensuring TS. This study proposes a multi-contingency TSCOPF model that retains the dynamics of all generators and includes a transient synchronous generator fourth-order dq-axis model. A program is developed that automatically reads the system data from standard files, builds the multiple-contingency TSCOPF model on a high-level modelling system and solves it using a non-heuristic interior point algorithm. This approach facilitates the application of the model to a variety of systems and scenarios. A TSC based on the speed deviation instead of the rotor angle is proposed. Results obtained on several standard systems are shown. The proposed method is applied to the northwest Spanish transmission system to obtain an optimised dispatch that ensures TS after any of a number of faults, and to assess the economic impact of fault-clearing times at different substations.

This study addresses the problem of voltage variations in active low-voltage distribution networks caused by distributed photovoltaic (PV) generation. Three strategies based on model predictive control (MPC) are introduced to flatten the voltage profile in a cost-optimal way. The compared strategies are the business as usual approach that manipulates a controllable on-load tap changer at the primary substation, the problematic feeder control strategy (CS) that adds an additional degree of freedom by controlling the critical secondary substations (SSs), and finally the compensation strategy, which controls the primary substation and compensates the non-critical SSs. A sensitivity analysis on the CSs has been conducted comparing the voltage variation reduction and the asset utilization with regard to the accuracy of the prediction models and the forecasted disturbance data. The results show that better (and more costly) characterisation of these parameters only provide a marginal improvement in the reduction of the voltage variations due to the restriction caused by the heavy tap change penalisation. Moreover, the tested case-study shows that the problematic feeder CS outperforms the compensation strategy in terms of larger voltage variation reduction for similar asset utilisation.

Distribution system reconfiguration has become a useful and affordable method for both real time and planning stages. Protection system is an inseparable part of the power systems, hence it should not be neglected in the process of feeder reconfiguration. This study introduces an executable reconfiguration method in real distribution networks considering operation and coordination of protective devices of the network. The objective of this study is to attain a configuration of the network, which achieves minimum active power loss and voltage deviation while protection system functions properly. In this regard, precise constraints are introduced and formulated to exclude configurations of the network, which may cause mis-coordination in protection system performance. Necessity and effectiveness of the constraints are demonstrated on 33-bus, 69-bus and 119-bus distribution test systems.

The half-bridge modular multilevel converter (HB-MMC) is one of the most promising topologies for high-voltage direct current (HVDC) systems. Unlike full-bridge MMC (FB-MMC) and clamp double sub-module MMC (CDSM-MMC), HB-MMCs are defenceless against DC side faults. Different types of DC circuit breakers (DC CBs) assisted with arrester banks/damping resistors such as solid-state CB and hybrid DC CBs can be used to interrupt the DC fault current. Arrester banks are used to protect against overvoltage after interrupting the fault current and in turn to demagnetise the circuit inductors. The main disadvantage of the arresters is that they forcibly break apart when they are overloaded. In this study, an arrester-less fault current limiter is proposed for HB-MMC configuration, which provides an opposing voltage during the DC side fault. This is achieved by inserting external pre-charged capacitors in the DC current path during the fault. The selection of these external capacitors, their suitable initial voltages, and their charging stations are also presented in this study. A comparison between the proposed scheme and the CDSM-MMC has been held as well. The proposed protection scheme is assessed using a simulation study for a point-to-point nine-level HB-MMC-based HVDC system.

This study presents an improvement of three phase backward/forward sweep (BFS) power flow calculation algorithm for radial distribution systems. BFS power flow method is an iterative method that is usually used for power flow calculations in distribution networks due to its convergence and easy applicability. The improvement of commonly used BFS method is based on using breadth-first search method for creation of modified incidence matrix. Such incidence matrix ensures minimum number of searching for connections between nodes. The result is much faster algorithm without accuracy loss. The calculation duration is especially important for real time calculations in active management of distribution system. Reduction of calculation duration by the proposed method is especially expressed in power flow calculations of unbalanced radial networks such as low voltage networks. The proposed method is tested on several unbalanced distribution networks and compared with commonly used BFS method. Results show that the proposed algorithm is accurate and more efficient than compared method.

Interpretation of oil test data for transformer insulation condition is essential towards justifying asset management practices. Traditionally, an empirical formula (EF) is used by asset managers. This study introduces principal component analysis (PCA) and analytic hierarchy process (AHP) as two alternatives. Through the use of an oil test dataset consisting of 39 in-service UK transmission transformers measured for multiple ageing related parameters, PCA demonstrated its potential in working directly with data to explore parameter relations as well as ranking transformers according to their conditions. AHP on the other hand presented a way to coherently aggregate criteria in a flexible hierarchical setup for identifying the weightages of the oil test parameters before interpretation of measurements. The interpreted conditions based on PCA and AHP, along with a track-record proven EF are similar, particularly for transformers at extreme ends of the insulation condition.

A new adaptive active islanding protection scheme is presented for a multiple photovoltaic (PV) based microgrid environment, where islanding detection parameters are estimated in adaptive manner according to operational PV penetration level. Dynamic threshold calculation is obtained by a piecewise cubic Hermite polynomial interpolation to detect islanding for a PV based voltage source converter (VSC), where inconsistent solar irradiation profile is subjected to the system connected to local utility through point of common coupling (PCC). The VSC pulse-width modulation inputs are obtained from primary second-order phase locked loop based control path, where instability to detect islanding is achieved by active injection of error dynamics (parallel islanding protection path). The disturbance injection is decided from islanding detection parameter (i.e. harmonic amplification factor, %HAF) of PCC voltage and the VSC instability is achieved by desired unstable closed-loop poles of parallel detection path. UL 1741 standard is considered for the proposed multi-PV microgrid, for worst-case scenario study.

This paper aims to develop a new method for identification of Power Quality (PQ) events based on Discrete Gabor Transform (DGT) with a Finite Impulse Response Window (FIR-DGT) and Type-2 Fuzzy Kernel-based Support Vector Machine (T2FK-SVM). The FIR-DGT extracted features from the input signals and the T2FK-SVM classified them. Using proper window function for DGT is essential. Iterated sine window was used as window function to extract the events' features. The iterated sine window's function is four times faster than the default window function of DGT. Kernel design is a main part of many Kernel-based methods such as SVM, so by using T2FK, the total accuracy of classification is enhanced. In the present work, use of this hybrid approach decreased the extracted features size, so the execution time and total required memory were optimized for the classification section. The simulation results revealed accurate classification and execution in the detection and classification of nine types of PQ events. The overall accuracy of the proposed method was comparable to other methods and the accuracy evaluated under noisy conditions. Hardware platform was developed for evaluating the proposed method based on ARM LPC 1768 microcontroller to assess accuracy of the method in real conditions.

Stochastic security constrained unit commitment (SSCUC) based on a DC model could be problematic in AC networks because the DC model is potentially inaccurate. However, solving SSCUC problems using an AC model is still very challenging. Accordingly, an improved linearised AC optimal power flow (ILACOPF) model is provided in order to optimise the SSCUC problem. The proposed SSCUC model includes a linear representation of network losses and reactive power and bus voltage magnitudes. Moreover, in this study, transmission switching (TS), a powerful tool for grid side flexibility, is introduced and utilised to facilitate the mitigation of the uncertainty of wind power generation. Nevertheless, solving the SSCUC problem with TS in a full AC network is still one of the challenges in practical implementation, which is facilitated by the proposed ILACOPF model. Additionally, the aim of this study is to develop a more accurate power flow model to obtain a more realistic SSCUC solution using TS. The proposed ILAC-SSCUC model using TS is formulated as a mixed-integer linear programme, being solved by the proposed effective solution approach based on Benders’ decomposition. Numerical simulations on a 6-bus and IEEE 118-bus systems have been performed to evaluate the effectiveness of the method.

In this study, sequence currents based adaptive directional overcurrent relaying approach for distribution networks (DNs) with distributed energy resources (DERs) is proposed. Owing to the grid-connected mode and islanded mode operations, the magnitude and direction of fault currents are altered. Such different modes of operation result in protection failure and loss of coordination between directional overcurrent relays (DOCRs). With inception of faults, the current contributed by the inverter-based DER is in the range of 2 pu. Protection coordination is achieved by the adapting relay settings for each operating mode of DERs using the stored conventional relay settings, and the protection coordination is further improved by using negative-sequence overcurrent-based backup DOCR. The direction of the fault is obtained using the phase change in superimposed and prefault positive-sequence currents. The proposed technique is implemented on a dSPACE processor, which is connected to a real-time digital simulator to carry out the hardware-in-the-loop test. Extensive simulation and hardware results obtained for several DN operating modes. The adaptive approach is compared with the conventional approach and results indicate that the adaptive approach provides accurate operating time for primary and backup relays. This proposed approach is independent of the voltage information.

In this study, a market framework is proposed for the practical implementation of lossy financial transmission rights (FTRs). The advantage of lossy FTRs over conventional FTRs is that the lossy FTRs can be settled directly according to locational marginal prices (LMPs) without requiring any LMP decomposition. Therefore, the price risk for a forward contract can be perfectly hedged if the power transaction involved perfectly matches the corresponding FTR. Although proposed long back, lossy FTRs still did not find an entry to the market because of the prejudice of market complexity and inefficiency. The principal aim of this study is, thus, to create the necessary environment so as to make those fine risk-hedging tools available in the market. First of all, a suitable format for forward contracts is prescribed to enable proper utilisation of lossy FTRs. The detailed lossy FTR auction model is prepared based upon a suitable optimal power flow (OPF) formulation. In addition, the implementation of lossy FTRs is shown for an AC–DC system by appropriately modelling the DC-line power flow behaviour according to the chosen OPF framework. The lossy FTR auction model prepared is thoroughly verified for the FTR issuance as per the market expectations.

This study presents the development of a new fault zone identification scheme for busbar using logistic regression binary classifier by utilising one cycle post-fault current signals of all the bays connected to the busbar. Practicability of the presented scheme has been verified by modelling an existing 400 kV Indian power generating station in power systems computer-aided design/electro-magnetic transient design and control software package. The presented scheme has been tested on enormous cases (38,400) which were generated by varying system and fault parameters. The proposed scheme provides effective discrimination between internal and external faults with a very high (99.69%) overall accuracy. Moreover, it remains stable in case of heavy through fault conditions particularly with current transformer saturation during which the conventional differential protection scheme mal-operates. Furthermore, it provides equally compatible accuracy for unknown system/unseen data set as well as for double/one-and-half breaker busbar arrangement. In addition, performance of the proposed scheme has been verified on the laboratory prototype and results are found to be satisfactory. The average tripping time is of the order of 23 ms in case of internal faults. At last, comparative evaluation of the proposed scheme with recently presented schemes in the literature indicates its superiority.

In view of the jump characteristic of power system, a time-delay stability control strategy that avoids the effect of jump progress is proposed in this study. First, the Newton–Leibniz formula based on the free weighting matrix and the time-delay system model considering Markov jump are introduced to the differential equation of Lyapunov–Krasovskii functional, and a non-linear minimising time-delay controller considering the jump characteristic of power system is designed. Then, the Schur complement is used to decouple the non-linear items in the control algorithm, so that the matrix inequalities containing the non-linear items are transformed to standard linear matrix inequalities. Thus, low solving efficiency due to iteration could be avoided. Time-domain simulation tests on the IEEE 16-machine 68-bus system verify that the proposed controller could effectively damp the inter-area oscillations before and after the system jump, and the system after jump will not go unstable due to the time-delay control measures before the jump. Compared with traditional time-delay control methods, the proposed method is suitable for power system with jump characteristic and has better computational efficiency.

This study presents automatic generation control (AGC) in the presence of a gate controlled series capacitor (GCSC) to provide an effective frequency control ancillary service for a two-area diverse-GENCOs multi-DISCOs power system. First, the contribution of the GCSC in tie-line power exchange is formulated mathematically and then a tilt-integral-derivative (TID)-based damping controller is proposed. The effectiveness of the proposed TID-based GCSC-AGC coordinated controller is compared with just AGC, proportional-integral-derivative-based GCSC-AGC, thyristor controlled series capacitor-AGC, static synchronous series compensator-AGC, and thyristor controlled phase shifter-AGC. A modified group search optimisation (MGSO) algorithm is employed to adjust the considered controllers. Physical limitations of generation rate constraint (GRC) non-linearity and governor dead-band (GDB) effect are taken into account in the evaluations to obtain realistic results. Bilateral contracts and pool-co transactions are considered concurrently for the realisation of a competitive environment. Simulations reveal that the proposed controller outperforms the other controllers in providing better dynamic responses. Additional evaluations are performed under the un-contracted step, sinusoidal and random load demands seen as contract violations to demonstrate the superiority of the proposed controller over other controllers. Sensitivity analyses are performed for different uncertainty scenarios to show the robustness of the proposed control approach.

The high-voltage direct current (HVDC) and HV alternating current (HVAC) hybrid transmission lines in the same corridor is an effective way to enhance the power transmission capacity of the corridor and save land resource. The transmission lines parameters such as the corridor width, the height of transmission lines, and electromagnetic environment can be analysed and optimised by the calculation of the hybrid ion-flow field. In this study, nodal discontinuous Galerkin time-domain method is for the first time applied to the calculation of the hybrid ion-flow field. Furthermore, corona interactions between the HVDC and HVAC lines are considered in the process of numerical solution. Compared with measured results and previous methods, the proposed approach is verified to be able to obtain wiggle-free numerical solution with significantly reducing the computational burden, and meanwhile, the calculation precision is increased greatly. The ground-level electric field and ion current density of the hybrid lines in time domain are analysed, and then the time-domain characteristic is explored. Finally, the ion-flow fields of the hybrid ±800 kV DC/500 kV AC transmission lines in parallel and on the same tower have been made a comparative analysis and optimisation, which provide theoretical basis for real hybrid towers design.

This study is an effort to evaluate the numerical indices for the assessment of frequency response analysis (FRA) to provide a deeper understanding of their characteristics. First, the study introduces the indices in the literature and categorises them into three groups. Then, the results of 11 case studies from an experimental setup, two transformer models, and a power transformer real case are employed to examine the indices from the monotonicity aspect. Moreover, a short review on the interpretation experiences with indices is reported for further understanding. This contribution continues with a novel uncertainty analysis on the measurement setup and, finally, evaluates the indices based on their vulnerability to these uncertainties. Although the results show the advantage of some indices over the others in the FRA interpretation, further studies, especially with large transformers in the field, are needed to reach a general conclusion.

Based on the benefits of real-time pricing both to individual users and the society as a whole, this study introduces a real-time charging price (RTCP) mechanism supported by an intelligent charging management module into plug-in hybrid electric vehicles (PHEVs) charging environment. The optimal RTCP is executed by a distributed algorithm using a utility model to maximise the whole charging system welfare. The willingness-to-charge parameter is derived to reflect the charging preferences of PHEV users and their different responses to the RTCP. Several scenarios are established to discuss the effect of both the RTCP and willingness-to-charge on charging load. The simulation results show that reasonable charging will be realised based on the optimal RTCP mechanism.

This study presents a methodology for distribution system (DS) reconfiguration in the presence of distributed generations with objectives of minimising real power loss, switching operations as well as maximising the voltage stability margin while maintaining the constraints of bus voltage, branch current carrying capacity and radiality of DS. Furthermore, small signal stability of the system has also been considered in the formulated reconfiguration problem. To obtain the pareto-optimal solutions of this constrained multi-objective optimisation problem, knee point-driven evolutionary algorithm, is applied. In contrast to the non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm-II (NSGA-II)-based approach, preference is given to the knee points among non-dominated solutions in selection and tournament mating. Therefore, it maintains better balance between the convergence of the method and the diversity in the population. The method has been tested on IEEE 33-bus, 69-bus and 119-bus radial DSs to demonstrate its feasibility and effectiveness. The obtained results have also been compared with those obtained by the multi-objective NSGA-II-based method.

This paper proposes a power exchange strategy for sustainable microgrids (MGs) of remote areas that have no access to a utility grid. This strategy manages the MG during power deficiencies under a decentralised approach (DA), which is the most probable case for remote MGs due to the lack of communication systems, or a centralised approach if a data communication system is available. Under each approach, a two-level (internal/external) control is established. The internal support is provided through power exchange with local energy storage while the external support is provided through power exchange with a neighbouring MG, after their temporary coupling. Appropriate conditions and constraints, under which the necessity and possibility of internal/external power exchange can be determined, are defined and formulated. These terms are based on local frequency measurements (for DA) and instantaneous power generation of the dispatchable distributed energy resources (for centralised approach). The dynamic performance of a remote system, composed of two MGs, operating with this strategy is evaluated by simulation studies in PSCAD/EMTDC. Furthermore, the small signal stability of such a system is investigated in MATLAB.

This study suggests a method based on stochastic multi-objective modelling for optimally timing, siting and sizing of sub-transmission substationsand medium voltage feeders, distributed generations and capacitors, simultaneously, in order to take more pros of recent developed technologies. Regards to comprehensive impact of uncertainties including: intermittent nature of renewable energy sources, load forecasting and market price errors, some strategies must be devised in order to well incorporate them into the problem. The mentioned problem is modelled by dynamic programming which NSGA-2 is chosen for optimisation purposes and then fuzzy set theory is applied to find the best compromise solution. The proposed scheme aims to minimise substations expansion and installation cost, medium voltage feeders installation and replacement cost, DG units installation and operation cost, capacitors installation cost, cost of purchased energy from the transmission network, active and reactive power losses cost, and connection cost of sub-transmission substations to the upstream network. Besides, risk based modelling of energy not-supplied as an efficient reliability index is incorporated to cost function in order to improve the reliability of the network. Also voltage deviation and voltage stability as the criterion of power quality in distribution networks and emission reduction are treated as independent objective functions.

Utilities apply a fuse-saving strategy during auto-reclosing on transient faults. Integration of distribution generation (DG) into distribution networks (DNs) challenges this strategy as the fault current contribution from the DG may lead to the loss of recloser–fuse coordination. This study proposes a relaying scheme to be applied on microprocessor-based reclosers for fuse saving under transient fault conditions. A relay operating characteristic is defined which utilises voltage and current magnitudes at the recloser location. The voltage term in the relay characteristic compensates for the reclosing delay resulting from the DG fault contribution. The main features of the relaying scheme are use of local measurements, i.e. no communication link is required, and its independence of number and location of DG. The proposed relaying scheme is validated by simulation study on a practical 20 kV Iranian DN. It is shown that the new scheme maintains proper recloser–fuse coordination for different fault conditions and DG configurations. Moreover, the maximum DG penetration in different locations is obtained whilst the recloser–fuse coordination is upheld. It is shown in a comparative study that the proposed relaying scheme can maintain the coordination for higher DG penetrations than a recent adaptive method reported in the literature.

Loss of excitation (LOE) event threatens both the generator and power system stability. Numerous approaches have been proposed for LOE detection, most of which use the impedance trajectory. Such methods may maloperate under system disturbances, especially power swings. This study presents a new approach for LOE detection by estimating the field flux linkage participation (FFLP) in the stator flux linkage. Intrinsically, this newly defined index mainly depends on the generator excitation system and thus highly reduces when an LOE takes place. The FFLP parameter can easily be calculated using stator voltage and current signals. All kinds of LOE events cannot be studied using most available simulation software. To cover all of them, utilising state variables, a generator model connected to a power system is implemented. Performed simulation studies demonstrate that the proposed strategy not only considerably decreases the LOE relay operation time, but also improves the LOE relay security against system disturbances. In addition, the proposed approach is experimentally evaluated on a 10 kVA synchronous generator.

In modern power systems the smooth control of active power flow is one of the major concerns for power industry. In the current study the authors devise an adaptive fractional order robust damping control system for static series synchronous compensator connected to an infinite power transmission network. A detailed non-linear state model is presented with inclusion of parametric uncertainties, disturbances and other non-linearities. A novel fractional order sliding manifold is proposed and based on it an adaptive fractional order controller is derived. The uncertainty in the state model is estimated online using the adaptive control system. The stability and the convergence proof of the closed loop system is verified using fractional order Lyapunov theorem. Furthermore, the proposed control scheme is compared with the classical proportional integral derivative, integer order sliding mode and fractional order controllers under different scenarios. The effectiveness of the proposed control scheme is verified using numerical simulations.