The Application of Robust Optimization in Power Systems

(PSERC) is a multi-university Center conducting research on challenges facing the electric power industry and educating the next generation of power engineers. More information about PSERC can be found at the Center's website: Notice Concerning Copyright Material PSERC members are given permission to copy without fee all or part of this publication for internal use if appropriate attribution is given to this document as the source material. This report is available for downloading from the PSERC website. Acknowledgements This is the final report for the Power Systems Engineering Research Center (PSERC) research project titled " The Application of Robust Optimization in Power Systems " (project S-51). We express our appreciation for the support provided by PSERC's industry members. i Executive Summary Power system operations are facing and will face new challenges as the level of variable resources increases along with higher levels of demand side uncertainty and area interchange. These added uncertainties make it harder for system operators to obtain robust solutions. Robust optimization allows for the modeling of an uncertainty set and ensures that the chosen solution can handle any possible realization based on this uncertainty set. This project has focused on the application of robust optimization for power system operations and operational planning. Part one of this project report provides an overview of robust optimization as well as it investigates two applications for robust optimization: robust unit commitment and robust corrective topology control. The optimal power flow models used within part one assume a linear approximation of the alternating current optimal power flow formulation. Therefore, part two is a complement to part one by providing a mechanism to test and validate the feasibility of the decision support tool solutions on nonlinear power flows. In summary, this research has developed new power systems decision making tools that utilize robust optimization as well as extensive analysis on the benefits and challenges to implement robust optimization within electric power systems. In standard optimal power flow (OPF) formulations, the system parameters are assumed to be constant, i.e., they are assumed to be known. However, in real life, system parameters are uncertain, such as system demand, renewable generation, generator availability, and transmission availability. To capture the uncertainty in system parameters related to demand and renewable resources, robust optimization techniques are proposed. The presented report is divided into two parts; the first part discusses the effect of robust corrective topology control on system reliability …