Optimal placement of phasor measurement units for state estimation

This paper proposes a methodology for optimal placement of Phasor Measurement Units (PMUs) for power system state estimation. A binary search algorithm is used to determine the minimum number of PMUs needed to make the system observable. The search process is exhaustive in nature; it eliminates the uncertainties of evolutionary search methods and the shortcomings of conventional optimization methods. In case of more than one solution, the one resulting in maximum measurement redundancy is taken as the optimal one. The proposed method is tested on the IEEE 14-bus and IEEE 30-bus test systems, and the results are reported and compared with the earlier results reported in the literature.