A Hybrid Heuristic and Evolutionary Algorithm for Distribution Substation Planning

This paper presents an enhanced evolutionary algorithm to solve the static distribution substation planning problem within large distribution networks. It is based on a deterministic heuristic algorithm to find the approximate substation service areas for each substation and an expert selection strategy that increases the convergence chance to a global optimal solution. The introduced algorithm takes different electrical constraints such as voltage drops, power flow, radial flow constraints, and all prevalent cost indices into consideration. In addition, effects of unreliability within network feeders and substations are investigated on the obtained layouts. The developed method is applied to four benchmark test systems and an actual large-scale distribution system with about 140 000 customers, followed by a discussion on results.