Fuzzy Optimal Phase Balancing of Radial and Meshed Distribution Networks Using BF-PSO Algorithm

Due to increasing neutral current and power losses resulting from phase unbalancing in distribution networks, the act of phase balancing has been a matter of interest in recent years. In this paper, a new method for phase arrangement of laterals and the distribution transformers is presented based on bacterial foraging (BF) oriented by particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm (BF-PSO). The algorithm is proposed for radial and meshed distribution networks in the presence of unbalanced loads. The objective function of this problem includes the neutral current of the supporting feeder, the rephasing cost, the voltage drop, and the line losses. Since these objectives do not have similar units and the same variation ranges, the four objectives are fuzzified and then integrated as the fuzzy multi-objective function. In order to prove the efficiency of the BF-PSO algorithm, its performance is compared with bacterial foraging, genetic and immune algorithms. To evaluate the proposed method, it is applied to feeder No. 3062 in Ahwaz, Iran. The simulation results confirm the efficiency of the method for the reduction of system costs and network phase balancing.