A Multi-population Hybrid Algorithm to Solve Multi-objective Remote Switches Placement Problem in Distribution Networks

This paper presents a multi-population hybrid algorithm to solve the switches placement problem in distribution networks considering remote and manual switches. A genetic algorithm in conjunction with local search procedure is used. In the procedure, reliability index, remote–manual controlled switch and investment costs are considered. The problem is formulated as a multi-objective optimization problem to be solved trough of weighted sum method. This method obtains the optimal solution considering a priori articulation of preferences established by the decision maker in terms of an aggregating function which combines individual objective values into a single utility value. A 282-bus test system is presented, and the results are compared to the solution given by other techniques. The results confirm the efficiency of the proposed method which makes it promising to solve complex problems of switches placement in distribution feeders. © 2015, Brazilian Society for Automatics--SBA.