A distributed optimization model for designing integrated operation policies of a multi-reservoir system

An optimal operation rule design problem of a multiple-reservoir system is considered. The operation rule design problem is formulated as an expected loss per period minimization problem in infinite time horizon which is a problem of a Markov decision process (MDP). The paper presents a method to covert a large (centralized) multi-dimensional MDP problem to a sequence of problems which consist of a coordination LP problem and small decentralized MDP problems for each subsystem.