An Asynchronous, Decentralized Solution Framework for the Large Scale Unit Commitment Problem

With increased reliance on cyber infrastructure, large scale power networks face new challenges owing to computational scalability. In this paper, we focus on developing an asynchronous decentralized solution framework for the unit commitment problem for large scale power networks. We exploit the inherent asynchrony in a region based decomposition arising out of imbalance in regional subproblems to boost computational efficiency. A two-phase algorithm is proposed that relies on the convex relaxation and privacy preserving valid inequalities in order to deliver algorithmic improvements. Our algorithm employs a novel interleaved binary mechanism that locally switches from the convex subproblem to its binary counterpart based on consistent local convergent behavior. We develop a high-performance computing oriented software framework that uses message passing interface to drive our benchmark studies. Our simulations performed on the IEEE 3012 bus case are benchmarked against the centralized and a state-of-the-art synchronous decentralized method. The results demonstrate that the asynchronous method improves computational efficiency by a significant amount and provides a competitive solution quality rivaling the benchmark methods.