Parallel particle swarm optimization for reactive power and voltage control verifying dependability

This paper presents a parallel particle swarm optimization (PSO) for reactive power and voltage control (Volt/Var Control: VVC) in electric power systems verifying dependability of the control. Considering high penetration of renewable energies and deregulation of power systems, electric power flows can change suddenly and operators in control centers have to control voltage in wider power systems. Therefore, VVC is required to shorten the control interval and handle larger-scale power systems. One of the solutions for this problem is applications of parallel and distributed computing. Since electric power systems is one of the infrastructures of social community, sustainable voltage control is crucial and dependability is strongly required for VVC. This paper investigates not only fast computation by parallel computation but also dependability of parallel PSO for VVC. The results are meaningful for practical parallel computation by PSO in actual VVC operations.