Customized optimal μPMU Placement method for distribution networks

Phasor Measurement Unit (PMU) has been applied on power system to improve the performance of power system state estimator for decades. It is anticipated that PMUs will observe distribution networks in future considering the contribution of PMUs to transmission networks. The advent of micro phasor measurement unit (μPMU) makes it possible to employ phasor measurement devices in distribution networks. Optimal PMU Placement (OPP) problem is to determine a minimal set of PMUs such that the whole system is observable. Since PMUs are mostly employed within transmission networks, most OPP algorithms are also designed for transmission networks. However, OPP algorithms designed transmission networks have not considered the radial topology of distribution networks. This paper investigated the different topology of transmission and distribution networks and proposed a customized OPP method for radial networks. The customized OPP method made use of radial topology of distribution networks to equivalently downsize the scale of the networks. Since the solution for OPP is usually difficult for large scale systems, the solution of OPP is accelerated by the customized OPP. The proposed method was tested on various IEEE distribution test feeders and transmission systems.