Flexible feeder interconnections for increased penetration of renewables and improved volt/VAr control in distribution networks

In this study, a daily distribution management system (DMS) is developed, which utilises the potential of soft open points (SOPs) to enhance the renewable share in power provision task. The active and reactive power contributions of SOPs, as a flexible interconnection, amend the voltage security issues due to high penetration of photovoltaics (PVs). A complete model for SOP is developed to address the conduction and switching losses that affect the technical and economic operation indices. The optimal scheduling framework of DMS is linearly modelled within mixed-integer linear programming to lower the computational burden of the problem. Case studies are carried out on IEEE 33-node system to illustrate and verify the effectiveness of the proposed model. The comparative analysis shows a lower operation cost besides the improved voltage profile and the reduced losses of the whole system. The effective collaboration of PVs and dispatchable distributed generations (DDGs) assisted by the SOPs power processes causes higher penetration of PVs and enhanced the exploitation of DDGs results in a 9.8% increment of PV power exploitation and improved power factor of DDGs operation.