296

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON EDUCATION, VOL. 38, NO. 3, AUGUST 1995

A General Maximum Power Transfer Theorem

C. S. Kong
Supply Voltage, E

Abstraet-This paper reviews the conventional maximum power transfer theorem and presents a modification to the theorem by incorporating a measure of the relative importance of power transmission efficiency over power transferred to the load.

I.

NRDCIN ITOUT O

Fig. 1. A simple AC circuit.

-1
RS+j X s
=

RL+jXL

The maximum power transfer theorem provides the condition which the load resistance or impedance must satisfy for maximum power absorption from the source network. This condition for maximum power transfer is summarized as follows: For maximum power transfer to the load, in DC circuit: Load resistance, RL = Source resistance, Rs in AC circuit: Load impedance, ZL = Conjugate of source impedance, 2, The efficiency of power transfer is completely disregarded in this theorem. Operating at the maximum power transfer condition is meaningful in low-power networks, such as communication and instrumentation systems, where it is desirable for the signal source to transmit as much power as possible to the receiver or load. In power utility systems, however, this theorem has limited application as operating the network at the maximum power transfer condition has only 50% transmission efficiency and a large voltage drop in the transmission feeder. Ironically, when transmission efficiency is high, power absorbed by the load is low. This is because whenever there is power transmission, power loss in the transmission network is inevitable. Hence increasing power supplied to the load can only be realized with decline in transmission efficiency. For low-power electronic circuits, maximization of power transferred is important whereas power utility systems are more concemed with the maximization of transmission efficiency. Maximum power transfer and maximum transmission efficiency are two contradicting requirements in electrical circuits. As it is not possible to maximize both power transferred and transmission efficiency, the optimal power flow condition is formulated as the maximization of the power transfer to the load at an acceptable maximum possible level of transmission efficiency. This paper derived the general optimum power flow condition for the load resistance or impedance by incorporating the factor a as a measure of the relative importance of power transferred compared to the transmission efficiency. When cy is small, the power transmission efficiency is a more important consideration than the power consumed by the load.

II. THEMODIFIED POWERTRANSFER CONDITION

Consider an AC circuit as shown in Fig. 1: Power loss in the network,
PLOSS

(Rs

+ RL) + ( X s + XL) Rs

E2

Power absorbed by load,

Let cy to be the weighting between power transfer and transmission efficiency.

Objective: Maximize Q = [(YPLOAD - a ) f i ~ s s ] . - (1 1

ffs

Note that when cy is unity, the problem degenerates to the conventional maximum power transfer condition. When a 0 in high transmission efficiency requirement, the objective is power loss minimization at the expense of power transferred.

-- L ~ X
For

aQ - 2 E 2 [ a R- (1 - a ) R s ] ( X s X L ) ~ -I[(Rs RL) (Xs XL)]

[ ~ R-L( 1 - a ) R s ] ( X s X L ) = 0

~ [ ( R S + R L ) ( X s + X L ) 2 ]- 2[cyR~ (1 - cy)Rs](Rs R L ) [(Rs RL) (Xs X L ) ~ ]

For

Manuscript received November 18, 1992; revised December 12, 1993. The author is with Nanyang Technological University, School of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Nanyang Avenue, Singapore 2263. IEEE Log Number 9411716.

From (l), X S

+XL = 0

0018-9359/95$04.00 0 1995 IEEE

LEEE TRANSACTIONS ON EDUCATION, VOL. 38, NO. 3, AUGUST 1995

297

.---.-__
0.2
01

.
0.1
I

g
I 3 U

z
w w

___.. -.- ----.....-..... -.-... .._____ --..... a = 0.4 /....

a = 0.6

-.-_ -.-.-.-_

-.-_ -.-.__

2
E

............................................................... .......

-.-.-.-.-.___. ......-....__..___-.__. -.-.-.-__._ ...........................

----

. . I . . . . . . .

........... ..........

0
b -0.1

-0.2

-0.3
0
2
4
6 8

10

LOAD RESISTANCE
Fig. 2. Graph of objective function Q against load resistance R L . Substitute into (2)

From (5) and (6), it can be deduced that For

hence,

and

This modified condition for maximum power expended in the load for a DC circuit can be deduced with X L = 0 and X s = 0 giving

A graph of the values of Q for various values of n is plotted. In medium power circuits where both the power transfer to the load and transmission efficiency are important operating considerations, the system designer and operator must first assigned the value for n in considering the relative importance between power transfer and transmission efficiency and then design or operate the circuit to maximize Q.

III.
From the above derivation, it can be shown that: At maximum Q,

APPLICATIONS

(3) PL*oss= ffz

[&]
PLOAD

(4)

Power transmission efficiency,

v=

&OAD

v*

-- RL RL -I-Rs a! = 1 - -.

+Ross
(7)

The above result is utilized in the following two examples to illustrate the different operating strategies between low-power communication or instrumentation circuit and power supply system. For low and medium power circuits, the optimal power flow condition is when the power delivered to the load is maximized given either the minimum allowable power transmission efficiency, vmin or the value of a. The load is implicitly assumed to be able to absorb this maximum power transferred to it from the source network. If qmin is given, let v* = vmin from (6) = 2( 1 - v m i n ) and the maximum power transferred to the load at the transmission efficiency of qmin is P;oAD which is given by (3). Example I: A communication circuit is to be designed where it is equally important to maximize the power delivered to the load and to minimize the power loss in R, for saving in the design of the heat dissipation system for R,.

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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON EDUCATION, VOL. 38, NO. 3, AUGUST 1995

Assigning equal weightings to f i o A ~and

ROSS, cy choose

0.5 and
P;oAD

= 0.75

[&]

at the transmission efficiency of q* = 0.75. In power supply system, the power delivered to the load is determined by the customer demand. The power supply network is operated to supply the required load as economically as possible. Hence the requirement is to supply a customer load of PL with the minimum acceptable transmission efficiency qmin. In this problem, P:OADis the maximum power transfer capability for the power circuit at the minimum allowable transmission efficiency of &in. P C O A D is computed as described above for low power circuit. If P ~ O A D then the power system has excess power transfer > PL capability at the allowable minimum operating efficiency of qmin to meet future increase in customer load. If P L O A D < PL then the present power circuit cannot supply the required customer load at the minimum transmission efficiency of qmin. The power system operator can adopt the following actions. Accept further reduction in the transmission efficiency from qmin if the excess customer power demand is of short term or infrequent nature. Reinforce the network by adding more power generating sources or parallel transmission feeders thereby reducing Rs . Upgrade the power supply network to a higher voltage level than E.

Each of these alternatives has its cost which is relevant in deciding which action is most economical. Example 2: A 20 kV power supply system is modeled as in Fig. 1 with Rs = 0.4 R and is to operate at a minimum allowable transmission efficiency qmin of 90%. Assuming X S X L = 0 i.e. the source is maintained at unity power factor, cy is computed from (7) cy = 2(1 - 0.9) = 0.2 Maximum power transfer capability of the system PLOAD 90 = MW. If the customer load is forecasted to increase to 120 M W , then to supply this load at qmin = 0.9 will require the voltage E to be increased. At higher supply voltage, the power transmission capability of the network is increased and more importance can be attached to reducing the power loss in the power network. Hence it is consistent to have cy < 0.2 for higher voltage network. Let cy = 0.1, the network can just supplied the forecasted load of 120 MW at the minimum transmission efficiency of q* = 0.95 if the supply voltage E is upgraded to 32 kV.

IV. CONCLUSION

This paper presented a modification to the maximum power transfer theorem which explicitly included the power transmission efficiency. The optimal power flow condition in practical circuits is an acceptable compromise between power transferred and the transmission efficiency. The parameter cy presented in this paper is a measure of the relative importance which the system designer or operator assigned to power transferred and transmission efficiency.