Power factor correction for ballast / Ahmad Syukri Bukhari

This project presents the design of power factor correction circuit for ballast type of load. Power factor correction is the process of increasing the power factor without altering the voltage or current to the original load. Alternatively, power factor correction may be viewed as the addition of a reactive element (usually a capacitor) in parallel with the load in order to make the power factor closer to unity. The main target of this project is to obtain the most suitable power factor correction capacitance value in order to improve the power factor of the load. The step-by-step design procedure, which involved many equations, have been implemented in this design. The model of power factor correction circuit is designed using computer simulation via PSCAD while the software is developed using Visual Basic program. This software is developed in order to calculate the capacitor value used to improve the power factor of the ballast. Thus for verification, this capacitor has been applied in the power factor correction circuit.