This work presents a novel custom power device (CPD) designed for dynamic management of reactive power and enhancement of voltage quality in smart grid (SG) systems under both fundamental and harmonic conditions. The approach utilizes real-time data obtained from smart meters installed at each bus and communicated to the smart grid central controller (SGCC). Based on this information, the CPD simultaneously performs the functions of a static synchronous compensator (STATCOM) and an active power line conditioner (APLC) by optimally compensating fundamental reactive power and harmonic currents at strategically selected buses. The proposed methodology incorporates two particle swarm optimization (PSO) techniques. The first PSO algorithm is applied under worst-case operating scenarios to identify optimal placement and sizing of CPDs. The second PSO algorithm leverages continuous smart meter data to generate real-time reference signals for both fundamental and harmonic compensation, ensuring effective control of the installed CPDs. The optimization objectives include minimizing costs related to voltage profile improvement, total harmonic distortion of voltage (THDv), and device sizing, subject to constraints such as maximum CPD capacity and permissible limits of fundamental and harmonic bus voltages. Comprehensive simulations are carried out using MATLAB/Simulink to validate the effectiveness of the proposed approach. The system performance is tested on a distorted 15-bus smart grid with six nonlinear loads, ensuring compliance with IEEE-519 standards.

The main conclusions drawn from the detailed simulations of the 15-bus distorted smart grid (SG) with six nonlinear loads (Figs. 7–8) are summarized as follows: • The application of multiple CPDs, incorporating both STATCOM and APLC functionalities, effectively maintains the THDv of all buses within the permissible limit of 5%, while simultaneously regulating the fundamental bus voltages above the minimum acceptable limit of 0.9 pu (Tables 3–4, Fig. 10). • The optimal number, sizes, and locations of CPDs depend on the SG configuration, constraint limits, and the number, types, and locations of nonlinear loads. The objective function weighting factors (Eq. (9)) significantly influence the siting and sizing results (Table 7). Larger values of Wsizelead to solutions with more CPDs but smaller total capacity, with THDv values approaching the upper limit of 5%. In contrast, higher values of WTHDyield lower THDv levels but require a larger number of CPDs, increasing installation and maintenance costs. Therefore, equal weighting factors WsizeWTHD0.5are recommended to achieve a balanced trade-off. • The optimally allocated CPDs significantly enhance SG performance by enabling real-time control of network THDv and fundamental bus voltages Vfundunder varying operating conditions (Table 8, Figs. 9–10). • The allocated CPDs can also be operated in a coordinated manner to function as either STATCOMs or APLCs in real time, enabling control of reactive power (and hence voltage regulation) at the fundamental frequency or mitigation of harmonic distortions across the network, as demonstrated in Tables 5 and 6, respectively.

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