Constrained Composite Differential Evolution Search for Optimal Site and Size of Distributed Generation Along with Reconfiguration in Radial Distribution Network

Abstract

This paper proposed a novel method to find the Optimal Feeder Reconfiguration (OFR) of radial distribution network along with optimal site and size of Distributed Generation (DG) with an objective of power loss reduction. OFR and DG allocation problems are highly non-linear and complex optimization problems, complexity of problem is further increased with the addition of distribution operation constraints. In the last two decades, Evolutionary Algorithms (EAs) have been implemented successfully to find the OFR and DG allocation considering different objective functions. However, search space adopted by EAs are unconstrained, therefore numerous methodologies are adapted to discard infeasible solutions. The penalty approach is most widely used in the literature, it requires appropriate selection of penalty parameters using a tedious trial and error method. In this paper, a new EA Constrained Composite Differential Evolution (C2oDE) is proposed find optimal capacity and site of DG along with reconfiguration problem. In the proposed algorithms three trial vectors are generated to strike balance among exploration and exploitation. Furthermore, to find the feasible solutions in the decision space two most widely used constraint handling techniques that include feasibility rule and ɛ-constrained method are added to select the trail vector and individuals respectively for the next generation. Proposed C2oDE method has been validated by considering IEEE 33-bus, 69-bus and 119-bus distribution networks at five different cases. Simulation results obtained shows better performance of proposed method against the most recent literature to find both OFR and DG allocation