IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 20, NO.
2, APRIL 2005
A Decomposition Approach to Optimal Remote
Controlled Switch Allocation in Distribution Systems
P. M. S. Carvalho, L. A. F. M. Ferreira, and A. J. Cerejo da Silva
Abstract—The growing demand for improved quality of service
increases the importance of network automation, namely the in-
vestment in remote-controlled switch (RCS) devices. These allow
improving the fault isolation and reconfiguration time and there-
fore increasing the system quality of service. The investment in
switch devices comes at a cost and thus must be optimized. The
problem of determining the optimal number of devices and their
optimal location is a difficult problem: the solution space is combi-
natorial and the objective function is nonanalytical. We propose to
address this problem in a two-stage decomposition approach. Re-
sults are presented to i) divide the solution space into independent
subspaces, and then ii) solve the optimization problems in each sub-
space. The solution approach is illustrated for a real distribution
network problem.
Index Terms—Circuit topology, optimization methods, power
distribution economics, power distribution planning, power dis-
tribution reliability.
I. INTRODUCTION
P OWER interruptions impose costs on society by inter-
rupting the normal flow of commerce and disrupting
the provision of important services. One way of reducing the
interruption costs is to reduce the outage time by investing in
facilities such as remote controlled switches (RCS) devices.
RCS installation allows improving i) the fault isolation time
when installed in normally closed branches and ii) the fault
(island) reconfiguration time when installed in normally open
branches. By improving operation times, RCS devices improve
outage time and thus increase the overall system quality of
service. As RCS installation comes at a considerable cost [1],
the selection of the RCS installation sites must be selected in
order to optimize its benefit/cost tradeoff. This optimization
problem is the subject matter of the paper.
Several authors addressed the problem of sectionalizing
switch allocation in distribution networks [2]. They proposed
different heuristics based on different techniques to address the
problem. Techniques proposed include genetic algorithms [3],
[4], simulated annealing [1], and other heuristics based on the
Bellman’s principle of optimality [5].
In this paper we propose to address the problem of RCS al-
location with classical optimization. The techniques used are
Manuscript received July 31, 2003; revised December 18, 2003. Paper no.
TPWRD-00409-2003.
P. M. S. Carvalho and L. A. F. M. Ferreira are with the Instituto Superior
Técnico, Technical University of Lisbon, Lisbon, 1049–001 Portugal (e-mail:
pcarvalho@ist.utl.pt; lmf@ist.utl.pt).
A. J. Cerejo da Silva is with Escola Superior de Tecnologia, Instituto
Politécnico de Castelo Branco, Castelo Branco, 6000-767, Portugal (e-mail:
cerejo@est.ipcb.pt).
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TPWRD.2004.838470
0885-8977/$20.00 © 2005 IEEE
1031
decomposition and convex analysis. We propose a simple and
effective algorithm to divide the solution space into smaller in-
dependent subspaces and this way take advantage from the weak
interconnectivity of most distribution network feeders. We then
project the subspace objective function into a convex direction
(the number of RCS direction) and use convexity to reduce the
search effort necessary to find the optimum in each subspace.
The paper is organized as follows. In Section II the optimiza-
tion problem is formulated, the complexity of the problem is
evaluated, and two problem properties are derived. In Section III
the solution approach is presented. We use the derived properties
to propose effective algorithms to decompose the problem into
subproblems and then solve each subproblem independently. In
Section IV the proposed approach is illustrated with an example
from a real urban distribution network. In Section V we con-
clude the paper.
II. OPTIMAL RCS ALLOCATION PROBLEM
Distribution networks are constituted by several feeders from
different substations. Each feeder defines a radial configura-
tion from the substation transformers to the loads. Frequently,
feeder-ends are connected to each other within the same feeder
and to other feeders through normally open switches. Hence,
the distribution network topology consists in a graph over which
some open switches define a radial configuration.
A. Notation
The following notation is used in the formulation of the op-
timal RCS allocation problem:
reliability benefit function;
G branches of the distribution network graph;
S branches for possible RCS location;
unitary cost of the RCS devices;
selection of branches from S.
Other notation is used throughout the paper and defined when
necessary.
B. Formulation
The unitary cost of RCS devices may include installation and
maintenance costs. In the following we will refer to such costs
as the RCS investment cost.
The optimal RCS allocation problem consists in finding the
best possible tradeoff between RCS investment costs and reli-
ability benefits. Let the reliability benefit function be given by
, where stands for a reference reliability
cost and refers to the reliability cost function. The relia-
bility cost function must represent the system outage cost. One
1032
Fig. 1. Illustration of the problem solution representation. The solution is
represented by a binary array x indexed to an array of branches from S. The set
of branches selected by x in S is x(S) = fa; b; d; f; g; i; k g.
usual approach to evaluate the system outage cost is to compute
the cost of the energy not supplied (ENS). Other costs imposed
by the regulator as penalties for quality of service below defined
standards can also be added [6].
The problem solution may be represented by binary branch
decisions: either a RCS is to be placed in a branch or not. We
take a binary array to select branches from S (see Fig. 1) and
refer to as the set of braches selected by in S.
Considering the binary representation of the solution , the
problem of finding the best possible tradeoff between RCS in-
vestment costs and reliability costs may be formulated as in the
following:
overall
To compute the reliability cost the expected value of the ENS
is computed. The expected value of the ENS is computed numer-
ically, not analytically. Branch faults are enumerated exhaus-
tively (for each and every branch of the network graph G) and
the correspondent post-fault configurations analyzed for
overloads and undervoltages. For each fault, the processes of
isolation (with time ), reconfiguration (with time ) or repair
(with time ) are analyzed in G and the corresponding ENS
computed for given branch failure rates. The reliability cost is
then computed from the value of the ENS for a given ENS price.
The existence of a RCS device: (i) changes the time to isolate
faults if the RCS is placed in a normally closed branch;
and (ii) changes the time to reconfigure faults in other branches
if the RCS is placed in a normally opened branch. When
more than one RCS can be closed to restore power in an iso-
lated network section (island), the ENS is evaluated for the best
switching operation. The best switching operation is chosen
with the following rules:
R1) The best operation is the one that leads to fewer circuit
overloads if all operations do lead to overloads;
R2) The best operation is the one that leads to the better
voltage profile if two (or more) operations can be done
without circuit overloads;
R3) The best operation is the faster operation if two (or
more) operations can be done without circuit overloads
and without node undervoltages. The faster operation
is usually a RCS operation.
C. Complexity
The problem formulated in (1) is a difficult problem both be-
cause i) the reliability function is difficult to evaluate, and ii) the
space dimensionality is very high. If we designate by the size
of S, the solution space is where stands
for the number of -combinations of elements.
IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 20, NO. 2, APRIL 2005
Techniques have been proposed to reduce the problem com-
plexity by using the Bellman’s principle of optimality [5]. How-
ever, the problem, as we formulate it, is not suitable for the appli-
cation of the Bellman’s principle of optimality. The Bellman’s
principle of optimality states that the optimal solution with
RCS, say , must be achieved by adding one RCS device to a
solution, say , in a way that solves the optimal problem
of getting from to . The principle does not state that the
solution is the optimal solution with RCS—in
general it is not [7]. Because solutions of (1) are sets of branches
where order does not matter, and the optimal solution cannot
be directly related to optimal solutions with different number of
RCS, the Bellman’s principle of optimality is not used to reduce
problem complexity.
We reduce problem complexity by (i) using a polynomial-
time partitioning algorithm to divide the set S into several in-
dependent subsets, say and (ii) decomposing the
problem into a set of convex independent subproblems to be
solved independently. The approach consists in the decompo-
sition of (1) into the set of subproblems of (2), and further pro-
jection of subproblems into the convex maximization problems
of (3)
(1)
overall (2.1)
overall (2.2)
overall (2.3)
where
(2.4)
(2.5)
The projection of each maximization problem in into a max-
imization problem in the number of RCS, say , results in the
following problem formulation:
(3.1)
where
(3.2)
The theoretical framework for problem decomposition into a
set of independent convex subproblems relies on two problem
properties given in the following section.
D. Properties
Here we state two problem properties. The first property re-
lates the benefits of different sets of RCS. The second property
relates two different concepts of subproblem dependence. The
two properties constitute the theoretical framework for problem
decomposition and subproblem solution.
Property 1: Given any two sets of branches and :
.
Proof: For each possible faulted section, one of two pos-
sible situations occurs: (i) either the island may be restored by
connecting a RCS from one set only, and thus
; or (ii) the island may be restored by connecting
CARVALHO et al.: A DECOMPOSITION APPROACH TO OPTIMAL REMOTE CONTROLLED SWITCH ALLOCATION IN DISTRIBUTION SYSTEMS
Fig. 2. Illustration of analytical independence among topology dependent sets.
The figure shows a network with one substation (circle), 13 loads (triangles),
and two RCS (in branches x and y ). x and y are topologically dependent as
fa; bg =L L
\ . If the faults in fa; bg can be restored without overloads
or undervoltages only by connecting x (and never y ) then a RCS in y cannot
change ENS due to faults in fa; bg (see rule R3). So, x and y are analytically
independent despite being topologically dependent.
RCS from both sets and , and in such case the benefit
of being able to restore the fault is reported both in and
and thus .
Note that Property 1 generalization to more than two sets
is straightforward
. alone. If the benefit is negative, remove the RCS
The concepts of topological and analytical dependence are
defined in the following.
Definition 1: The set of loops is defined to be the subset
of G defined by the branches in the paths between every two
nodes adjacent to branches of .
Definition 2: Two sets of branches and are said to be
topologically independent iff .
Definition 3: Two sets of branches are said to be analytically
independent iff . A. Space Partitioning Algorithm
Take Property 2 to relate the two concepts of dependence.
Property 2: (First form). If two sets are analytically depen-
dent then the sets are also topologically dependent
(4.1)
(Second form). If two sets are topologically independent, then
the sets are also analytically independent
(4.2)
Proof: Analytical dependence results from the existence
of more than one RCS able to restore the same post-fault isolated
section (the island). A set of loops define a network subgraph
of the faults possible to be restored with branches of . If
two sets are analytically dependent, then there must be at least
one branch-fault possible to be restored either with a branch
of or with a branch of . To be so, such branch must
belong to both and . Hence, and cannot be mutually
exclusive. The equivalence between the first and second forms
of Property 2 derives directly from De Morgan’s basic law:
. the benefit of the sets’ union. If the benefit of the sets’ union is
The second form of Property 2 allows using topology analysis
to divide the set of possible RCS locations S into analytically
independent subsets. However, our experience shows that an-
alytical independence is found frequently among topology de-
pendent sets—(4.1) is an implication, not an equivalence. That
1033
occurs when the faults of cannot be restored by (at
least) one of the sets (say ) because all switching operations
lead to circuit overloads or undervoltages. Hence, subset inde-
pendence should be investigated analytically, not topologically.
Fig. 2 illustrates analytical independence among topology de-
pendent sets.
In the following section, we use the stated problem properties
to propose (i) a space partitioning polynomial-time algorithm to
divide the set S into analytically independent subsets, and (ii) an
optimization algorithm to solve the subproblems related to each
independent subset.
III. SOLUTION APPROACH
The proposed solution approach consists of three steps:
Step 1) Evaluate the benefit of placing each single RCS
from S.
Step 2) Run the space partitioning algorithm to divide S into
several independent subsets.
Step 3) Run the optimization algorithm over each indepen-
dent subset.
In the following, we give details of Step 2 and Step 3.
The space-partitioning algorithm consists in testing and clus-
tering RCS branch possibilities. We propose to test analytical
dependency with Definition 3 and cluster branches when de-
pendent. By doing so, we may divide the set of all RCS branch
possibilities into several clusters. Such clusters are the indepen-
dent subsets, as (i) within each cluster RCS branches are de-
pendent; and (ii) between different clusters RCS branches are
independent. The test and cluster algorithm can be designed to
be polynomial-time. We propose the following design:
Algorithm 1
Take sets of single RCS from S.
Their corresponding solutions may be represented by
The procedure starts with sets of single RCS and follows
a given order to visit them. Then, the benefit of each visited set
is added to the benefit of a downstream set and compared with
lower than the sum of the individual benefits, then the second
set is clustered to the visited one . When the
visited set is not the top one, the procedure must also try to
cluster the upstream sets. The proposed procedure is presented
in the following flowchart:
1034 IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 20, NO. 2, APRIL 2005

Fig. 3. Geographic view of the real 15 kV urban distribution network used for
illustration. Possible RCS locations are shown with squares an identified with
characters a, b, c, . . . k. The four HV/MV substations are shown as circles.

The final values of , represent each of the in-

dependent subsets. For instance if and
then the two independent subsets would be
and .

B. Optimization Algorithm

The optimization algorithm consists is finding in which

branches one should install RCS in order to maximize the }
objective function of (2). The projected problem of (3) consists
in solving the problem in . To compute for each , we
evaluate all the possible combinations of RCS and make IV. NUMERICAL RESULTS
. We then make use of
Property 1 to infer on the convexity of in and derive the The methodology presented in Section III is illustrated with
algorithm stopping criteria. To infer on the convexity of in an application example build over a real 15 kV urban distribu-
take the following steps: tion network. Fig. 3 depicts the geographical view of an under-
ground distribution network. The network cables are Aluminum
— Define ; cored with size between 50 (98,680 Mils) and 240
— Note that is a monotone increasing function of ; (473 600 Mils).
— Note that is a sublinear function of (Property 1); From all possible RCS locations, eleven normally open
— As is linear in , is convex in . points were considered. These have been selected to be the
The convexity of assures that there is a single relative max- most promising sites as their feeders had a history of high
imum in , and that can be used to reduce the optimization ef- failure rates and difficulty of site access. When operations
fort. Convexity allows to find the optimum by defining any practice and historical data are not available the sites to be con-
increasing direction (e.g., increasing ) and stopping just before sidered can be selected based on individual RCS benefits. The
decreases. The following algorithm can be used to find sub- individual benefits of installing each RCS have been calculated
problem solutions of (2). and are shown in Table I. These are shown in percentage of the
Algorithm 2 total benefit of installing all eleven RCS devices.
Given a subset of dependent RCS, the following loop To illustrate the projection of the maximization problem in
can be used to find the optimum solution . into a maximization problem in [see (3)], we also show in
CARVALHO et al.: A DECOMPOSITION APPROACH TO OPTIMAL REMOTE CONTROLLED SWITCH ALLOCATION IN DISTRIBUTION SYSTEMS 1035

TABLE I
INDIVIDUAL RCS BENEFITS

TABLE II
COMBINED RCS MAXIMUM BENEFITS

Fig. 4. The figure shows three functions of the number of RCS devices, k . The
functions are (i) the maximum benefit B (shown with 3); (ii) the investment
+
cost c 1 kxk (shown with ); and (iii) the function F as the difference of the
previous two functions (shown with o). Values are shown in percentage of the
maximum benefit. The optimal solution is found for k =5 and the following
branch selection fb; c; d; g; ig.

Table II the combined maximum benefits for each value to-

gether with the best combination of RCS devices. Fig. 4 com-
pletes the illustration by showing the combined benefits together
with the corresponding investment and the tradeoff costs evolu-
tion with the number of devices, .
To illustrate the advantages of the algorithms proposed con-
sider the following. To be able to find (exhaustively) the best
combination of RCS branches one would have to evaluate
solutions by running reliability analysis 2047 times
to access the ENS cost differences. Supposing that we do so,
exhaustive search would yield an optimal solution with
. This solution involves the selection of the set of branches
and corresponds to the following array:
(5)
Fig. 5. Subproblem objective function F for each of the four independent
Now observe that the partitioning of S with Algorithm 1 leads S S S S
subspaces , , and , respectively. The optimal solution is found for
to four independent subsets, namely: , , k =1 S in and the selection of branch b; k =2 S in and the selection of
, . The partitioning process in- =1 S
branches fc; dg; k in and the selection of branch g ; k=1 S in and
the selection of branch i. Values are shown in percentage of the total maximum
volves solely evaluations. The resulting benefit (as in Fig. 4).
subproblem objective functions are shown in Fig. 5.
Finding the best combination of RCS by exhaustive search in
, , and now involves By comparing (5) with (6) note that the equality
evaluations instead of the previous 2047. The holds. The set of branches
optimal solutions for each subset , , and correspond is shown in entry number five of Table II and its corresponding
to the following arrays: cost/benefit tradeoff presented in Fig. 4 for .
The partitioning of S can be used to reduce problem com-
(6) plexity in a great deal. Algorithm 1 alone reduces the necessary
1036
number of evaluations by 97% (from 2047 to
evaluations).
Using Algorithm 2 after the partitioning of S (with Algorithm
1) will again reduce the already very small number of necessary
evaluations.1 Fig. 5 reports the subproblem objective functions
for each of the four independent subspaces , , and
. Remark that: (i) to find the optimum in we need just
ten evaluations instead of fifteen, , evaluations; and (ii)
to find the optimum in we need six evaluations instead of
seven, . Together, the two algorithms allow an important
reduction on the necessary number of evaluations—a reduction
from 2047 evaluations to fifty-four (32 22) evaluations.
V. CONCLUSION
RCS devices allow improving the fault isolation and recon-
figuration time and this way increasing the system quality of
service. Because the investments in such devices can be costly,
their allocation needs to be optimized. In the paper we propose
an approach to determine the optimal number of RCS devices
and their optimal location in order to maximize the tradeoff be-
tween ENS costs and investment costs.
The paper presents two problem properties that may be used
to design (i) a polynomial time algorithm for space partitioning
into independent subspaces; and (ii) a convex optimization al-
gorithm to solve the optimization problem in each subspace. We
proposed an algorithm for each purpose and illustrate the overall
solution framework with an application example taken over a
real urban distribution network.
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P. M. S. Carvalho received the electrical and computer engineering degree, the
M.Sc. degree, and the Ph.D. degree from the Instituto Superior Técnico (IST),
Lisbon, Portugal, in 1992, 1994, and 1999, respectively.
Since 1992, he has been with IST, Department of Electrical Engineering and
Computers, where currently he is an Assistant Professor.
L. A. F. M. Ferreira received the electrical engineering degree from the In-
stituto Superior Técnico (IST), Lisbon, Portugal in 1977 and the M.S.E.E. and
Ph.D. degrees from the Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, in 1983 and
1986, respectively.
From 1986 to 1989, he was with the Pacific Gas and Electric Company, San
Francisco, California, where he was a major developer of the Hydro-Thermal
Optimization program. Since 1989, he has been with IST, Department of Elec-
trical Engineering and Computers, where he is currently an Associate Professor.
A. J. Cerejo da Silva received the electrical and computer engineering degree
from the Instituto Superior Técnico (IST), Lisbon, Portugal, in 1996.
From 1995 to 1998, he was with the Planning Department of Electicidade
do Sul (SLE) at Electricidade De Portugal and with Delphi Packard in Castelo
Branco. Since 1998 he has been with Instituto Politécnico de Castelo Branco,
Department of Electrical Engineering and Telecommunications.