Adaptive Decentralized Under-Frequency Load Shedding for Islanded Smart Distribution Networks

Frequency stability of islanded smart distribution networks with peer-to-peer (P2P) controlled distributed generators (DGs) has attracted special attention recently. Using power line communication (PLC) technology, a multi-agent system (MAS)-based, decentralized, under-frequency load shedding (UFLS) scheme is investigated in this study for smart distribution networks with the communication constraint that each agent can only communicate with its neighboring agents. The proposed scheme uses the two-layer nearest neighbor consensus algorithm (NNCA) to overcome the drawback of the leader–follower consensus algorithm and guarantee the implementation of a decentralized UFLS. Based on the global information (i.e., the magnitude of the total active power imbalance) discovered in the first layer of the NNCA, the multi-stage UFLS can be executed by the second layer of the NNCA. Simulation results demonstrate that the proposed scheme can effectively implement the decentralized UFLS while maintaining the frequency stability of an islanded smart distribution network.