Recloser and Sectionalizer Placement for Reliability Improvement Using Discrete Event Simulation

This paper presents a cost-effective strategy to place automatic reclosers and sectionalizers into electric distribution systems for reliability improvement using simulation and probability. Evaluation of reliability indices in the placement process is carried out via discrete event simulation that takes advantage of high performance parallel computing cluster. The requirements on probabilities evaluated from the empirical distributions of two reliability indices (SAIFI and CAIDI) are imposed as placement constraints or objectives, rather than the annual sample means used in the conventional placement problems. As a result, our placement solution is robust against the variability in model predicted SAIFI and CAIDI. The proposed placement strategy is illustrated through a Roy Billinton Test System (RBTS).