A Hierarchical Voltage Control Strategy for Distribution Networks Using Distributed Energy Storage

This paper presents a novel hierarchical voltage control framework for distribution networks to mitigate voltage violations by coordinating distributed energy storage systems (DESSs). The framework establishes a two-layer architecture that integrates centralized optimization with distributed execution. In the upper layer, a model predictive control (MPC)-based controller computes optimal power dispatch trajectories for critical buses, effectively decoupling slow-timescale optimization from real-time adjustments. In the lower layer, a broadcast-based controller dispatches parameterized power regulation signals, enabling autonomous active power tracking by the DESS units. This hierarchical design explicitly addresses the scalability limitations of conventional centralized control and the cyber vulnerabilities of peer-to-peer distributed strategies. The effectiveness of the proposed control framework is verified on the modified IEEE 34-bus and 123-bus test feeder. The results show that the proposed method can mitigate the average voltage violation by 93.7% and show control robustness even under 60% communication loss condition.