Fast Resource Scheduling for Distribution Systems Enabled with Discrete Control Devices

This article proposes a framework for fast short-term scheduling and steady-state voltage control in distribution systems enabled with both continuous control devices, e.g., inverter interfaced distributed generators (DGs) and discrete control devices (DCDs), e.g., on-load tap changers. The voltage-dependent nature of loads is taken into account to further reduce the operating cost by managing the voltage levels. Branch and cut method is applied to handle the integrality constraints associated with the operation of DCDs. A globally convergent trust region algorithm (TRA) is applied to solve the integer-relaxed problems at each node during the branching process. The TRA subproblems are solved using interior point method. To reduce the branching burden of branch and cut algorithm, before applying TRA at each node, a simplified optimization problem is first solved. Using the convergence status and value of objective function of this problem, a faster decision is made on stopping the regarding branch. Solving the simplified problem obviates the application of TRA at most nodes. It is shown that the method converges to the optimal solution with a considerable saving in computation time according to the numerical studies.