A technical seminar on, “Excitation Controls-Automatic Voltage Regulators”, by Arvind Gupta, AGM, OTS-Electrical, Adani Power Ltd, Ahmedabad, was conducted by IEEE PES Student Branch Chapter, Amrita School of Engineering, Bengaluru, on January 20^th, 2016.

Mr. Arvind Gupta has a wide span of 15 years in the installation and commissioning of electrical systems of gas and steam turbine based power plants in India and abroad, while being with BHEL. He has experience in handling eight co-generation plants, 25 thermal power plants and three solar PV plants. His experience includes four years of power plant consultancy and teaching and research prior to joining construction life in BHEL. After BHEL, Mr. Gupta took up advanced research at the Technical University of Munich, Germany, for 4 months in the area of electric drives. After returning to India, he joined a firm as vice president in New Delhi. At present, Mr. Gupta is working with Adani Power Ltd, Ahmedabad, for the past six months in the Operations and Technical Services department.

The program started with Mr. Gupta’s explanation of the physics of flux generation, voltage production and the control of generator field current through automatic voltage regulators in a power plant environment.  AVR’s capability in improving dynamic/transient stability of operating power plants was also explained. He  gave a useful comparison of both brushless and static excitation systems, which are both employed at Mundra Thermal Power Plant (4 x 330 MW plus 5 x 660 MW) at Gujarat. A touch upon the Generator Capability Curve and its importance in understanding the behaviour of both machine and grid was given.

At the conclusion, the vote of thanks was given by T. Keerthana, student of 1st year M.Tech. As a token of gratitude, a memento was presented to Mr. Arvind Gupta by Ms. Mamatha, Assistant Professor, Department of EEE, Amrita School of Engineering, Bengaluru. The seminar was also addressed by K. Reethika Raj, student of 1st year MTech, Dept. of EEE. The lecture was attended by 3^rd year & 4^th year BTech, M.Tech and PhD students of Electrical and Electronics Department.