Multi-Objective Reconfiguration of Radial Distribution Systems using Reliability Indices

This paper deals with the distribution network recon- figuration problem in a multi-objective scope, aiming to determine the optimal radial configuration by means of minimizing the active power losses and a set of commonly used reliability indices for- mulated with reference to the number of customers. The indices are developed in a way consistent with a mixed-integer linear pro- gramming (MILP) approach. A key contribution of the paper is the efficient implementation of the -constraint method using lexico- graphic optimization in order to solve the multi-objective optimiza- tion problem. After the Pareto efficient solution set is generated, the resulting configurations are evaluated using a backward/for- ward sweep load-flow algorithm to verify that the solutions ob- tained are both non-dominated and feasible. Since the -constraint method generates the Pareto front but does not incorporate deci- sion maker (DM) preferences, a multi-attribute decision making procedure, namely, the technique for order preference by simi- larity to ideal solution (TOPSIS) method, is used in order to rank the obtained solutions according to the DM preferences, facilitating the final selection. The applicability of the proposed method is as- sessed on a classical test system and on a practical distribution system.