Optimal Scheduling of Distributed Energy Resources Considering Volt-VAr Controller of PV Smart Inverters

TL;DR

This paper develops an advanced scheduling model for distributed energy resources and PV smart inverters with Volt-VAr control, improving voltage regulation in unbalanced distribution networks using an accurate AC optimal power flow approach.

Contribution

It introduces a mixed-integer model of Volt-VAr droop controllers integrated into ACOPF, enabling effective local and feeder-level voltage management in unbalanced networks.

Findings

Enhanced voltage regulation at feeder level.

Practical inverter dispatch strategies.

Improved scheduling accuracy over recent methods.

Abstract

This paper proposes an operational scheduling model of distributed energy resources (DERs) and PV smart inverters with Volt-VAr controller using an accurate AC optimal power flow (ACOPF) in an unbalanced distribution network. A mathematical mixed-integer model of local Volt-VAr droop controller of the distributed mixed-phase PV smart inverters is proposed based on the IEEE 1547-2018 standard and is incorporated in the unbalanced ACOPF, which enables effective utilization of the Volt-VAr controllers to not only alleviate voltage issues locally but also at the feeder level. The proposed model is tested on two actual snapshots of a distribution feeder in Arizona. Also, the proposed operational scheduling method considering the Volt-VAr droop controller of PV smart inverters is compared with a recent work in scheduling of the PV smart inverters. The results illustrate that the PV smart inverters dispatches obtained by the proposed model can be practically implemented by local controller of inverters.