Determination of optimal PMU placement for fault location using genetic algorithm

This paper presents a new method to find minimum number of Phasor Measurement Units (PMUs), to determine the fault location of all the transmission network lines. Considering the installation cost of PMUs, it is important to investigate the placement scheme of the PMUs at minimal locations on the network in the sense that the fault location observability can be achieved over the entire network. In this paper a new algorithm is introduced to find an optimization problem for determining the place and minimum number of PMUs in order to find accurate place of any fault in power systems. The accuracy of suggested algorithm is independent from the fault type and its resistance. Optimization problem is solved by genetic algorithm method (GA). 41-bus 230 kv Tehran Transmission Regional Electric Network is used as a real case study.