Sparsity-leveraging Reconfiguration of Smart Distribution Systems
This work provides a convex relaxation for the traditionally nonconvex DSR problem, enabling efficient reconfiguration of smart distribution systems with distributed generation.
The authors reformulate the nonconvex distribution system reconfiguration (DSR) problem into a convex one using group sparsity, enabling identification of meshed, weakly-meshed, or radial configurations by adjusting a sparsity-tuning parameter. Numerical tests demonstrate the method's ability to reconfigure networks and incorporate voltage regulation constraints.
A system reconfiguration problem is considered for three-phase power distribution networks featuring distributed generation. In lieu of binary line selection variables, the notion of group sparsity is advocated to re-formulate the nonconvex distribution system reconfiguration (DSR) problem into a convex one. Using the duality theory, it is shown that the line selection task boils down to a shrinkage and thresholding operation on the line currents. Further, numerical tests illustrate the ability of the proposed scheme to identify meshed, weakly-meshed, or even radial configurations by adjusting a sparsity-tuning parameter in the DSR cost. Constraints on the voltages are investigated, and incorporated in the novel DSR problem to effect voltage regulation.