A Two-Loop Hybrid Method for Optimal Placement and Scheduling of Switched Capacitors in Distribution Networks

This paper presents a method to find the optimal size and place of the switched capacitors using a hybrid optimization algorithm. The objective function includes the active and reactive power of power plants, the capital and maintenance costs of capacitor banks, and the cost of active and reactive power losses in distribution lines and transformers. The impact of the load model on the optimal sizing and placement of switched capacitors is studied using three different scenarios: In the first scenario, all loads are voltage-dependent; in the second scenario, only a portion of loads are voltage-dependent; in the third scenario, all loads are voltage-independent. The proposed hybrid algorithm incorporates an outer and two inner optimization layers. The outer layer is executed by a genetic algorithm (GA), while the inner layer is performed by a GA, an exchange market algorithm (EMA), or a particle swarm optimization (PSO). The performance of GA-GA, GA-EMA, and GA-PSO hybrid schemes are compared on an IEEE 33-bus test system. Moreover, IEEE 33-bus and 69-bus networks are used to verify the effectiveness of proposed hybrid scheme against the gravitational search algorithm (GSA), a combination of PSO and GSA (PSOGSA), cuckoo search algorithm (CSA), teaching learning-based optimization (TLBO), and flower pollination algorithm (FPA). The results highlight the advantage of the proposed hybrid optimization scheme over the other optimization algorithms.