Centralized/Decentralized Power Management Strategy for the Distribution Networks based on OPF and Multi-Agent Systems

This paper proposes a two-stage strategy to enhance the performance of active distribution network (ADN) by optimally controlling the active/reactive power of the distributed generation (DG) to improve the power quality while maintaining the network constraints within the allowable limits. The proposed stages are executed in two-time frames: operational planning and real-time operation. The first stage is a centralized control implemented using optimal power flow (OPF) via particle swarm optimization to dispatch the DGs active/reactive power to minimize the real losses. In the second stage, a decentralized architecture of intelligent agents is proposed using Multi-Agent System (MAS) developed in Java Agent Development Framework (JADE) to manage the network by ensuring that the difference between the power generated from DGs and power consumed by loads is preserved in each zone until the OPF is implemented again in next timestep. To validate the proposed strategy, the IEEE 33-bus distribution network has been used and the results proved the efficacy of the proposed strategy in enhancing the performance and operation of ADNs.