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A Simple Algorithm for Distribution System Load Flow with Distributed

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Conference Paper · May 2014

DOI: 10.1109/ICRAIE.2014.6909127

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IEEE International Conference on R e c e n t A d v a n c e s a n d I n n o v a t i o n s i n E n g i n e e r i n g ( I C R A I E - 2 0 1 4 ) ,
May 09-11, 2014, Jaipur India
A Simple Algorithm for Distribution System Load
Flow with Distributed Generation
Sivkumar Mishra,Member IEEE Debapriya Das, Member IEEE
IIIT, Bhubaneswar
Odisha, India
sivkumar@iiit-bh.ac.in
Abstract—With increasing penetration of distributed
generators (DG) in power distribution system, the distribution
system load flow methods also need to be modified. Hence, the
selection of suitable model of DG is important for the accurate
load flow. In this paper, a simple algorithm for distribution
system load flow with DG is proposed considering DGs as
constant negative loads. The results for three test distribution
systems are presented.
Keywords—distributed generation, load flow, radial distribution
systems, forward backward sweep
I. INTRODUCTION
Load flow analysis is an important tool for power system
planning and operation. However, conventional load flow
methods such as Newton-Raphson or Fast Decoupled, which
are typically designed for electrical transmission systems, are
not suitable for power distribution system load flow analysis.
Distribution networks are typically radial in nature and the
feeders have high R/X ratio, hence are ill conditioned for such
load flow. For various applications in distribution
automation(DA) , several load flow methods have been
developed in the last two decades [1], which are known as
distribution system load flow (DSLF) methods. These methods
exploit the special topological characteristics of the radial
distribution networks (RDN). Among several DSLF methods,
forward backward sweep (FBS) based methods are proven to
be the most simple and fast method to carry out distribution
system load flow [2].
The electric distribution system recently gained focus due
to increasing penetration of distributed generators (DGs).
Integration of DGs into the distribution systems alters the basic
configuration from a passive system to an active one. This
brings in certain benefits [3-4] as well as challenges [ 5-6]. The
major technical benefits are [7]:
• Reduced line losses
• Voltage profile improvement
• Reduced emissions of pollutants
• Increased overall energy efficiency
• Enhanced system reliability and security
• Improved power quality
• Relieved T & D congestion
Subrata Paul
IIT, Kharagpur Jadavpur University, Kolkata
West Bengal, India West Bengal, India
ddas@ee.iitkgp.ernet.in speejupow@yahoo.co.in
Dugan [8] has enlisted fourteen challenges relevant to the
analysis of DG in the distribution systems such as providing
the screening applications, power flow solution, multiphase
analysis, circuit model size, dynamics, harmonics, determining
the value of DG, modeling sub transmission, assessing
distribution reliability, loss analysis, protective device
coordination, transformer connections etc. Thus, DSLF
analysis with DG has attracted researchers to model DGs in the
best possible way for suitable inclusion.
In the light of above developments, in this paper the DG
modeling issue for DSLF analysis is addressed. Considering a
FBS based DSLF method with a novel bus identification
scheme and constant negative power model of DGs, the results
for three test distribution systems are presented.
II. LOAD FLOW FOR RADIAL DISTRIBUTION NETWORKS
Literature review [1] reveals that many methods are
available to carry out load flow in a RDN. In this paper, a FBS
based load flow algorithm [9] is considered.
A. Modeling for a Balanced RDN
Assuming balanced nature of RDN, an equivalent single
phase feeder is shown in Fig.1. where a is the sending end bus,
a’ is the receiving end bus, Ia is the feeder branch current and
Zaa’ is the impedance of the branch feeder. The sending end
voltage Va and the receiving end voltage Va’ are related as per
(1).
Va' =Va - zaa.Ia (1)
Fig.1. Equivalent single phase feeder
The loads connected to various buses of a distribution
system are assumed as constant power loads. To implement the
load flow the load connected at each bus is represented as
equivalent current injections (ECI). Consider an arbitrary bus-i
of a RDN (Fig.2) where a constant complex power load
SLi=PLi+jQLi is connected. For bus i , the corresponding load
current injection or equivalent current injection (ECI) ILi is
computed as a function of the bus voltage Vi.
ILi = ( Pi − Qi) / Vi* , i = 1, 2............nb (2)
IEEE International Conference on R e c e n t A d v a n c e s a n d I n n o v a t i o n s i n E n g i n e e r i n g ( I C R A I E - 2 0 1 4 ) ,
May 09-11, 2014, Jaipur India
Pi and Qi in this case are equal to the corresponding loads PLi
and QLi at bus-i.

Fig.2. Equivalent current injection at bus-i

B. Bus Identification Scheme

For a fast implementation of FBS based load flow, Mishra
et al [10] have proposed several arrays for bus identification.
These arrays are proven to be extremely useful for its reduced
search time and fast implementation of load flow. For
convenience, a brief review of the various arrays as proposed in
[9-10] is presented here. Fig.4. Storage and pointer operation of mfs, mts, sb and nsb arrays

An array of dimension double the number of branches (nbr)
of a radial distribution system, namely, adb(2*nbr) is
proposed, which stores all the adjacent or neighboring buses of
each of the buses of the RDN. Two other arrays mf and mt of
dimension ‘nb’, where nb = number of buses in a RDN, are
proposed, which act as pointers of the adb array. These arrays
in turn govern the reservation of allocation of memory
locations for each bus, i.e mf and mt point to the starting and
end addresses in the adb array respectively. Similarly, all the
previous buses are identified and stored in an array pb. These
arrays can be formed from the general system data of a RDN.
Two more arrays, namely, nsb and sb are proposed. The
array nsb stores the number of subsequent buses corresponding
to various branches of a RDN and has a dimension equal to
nbr. The sb array stores all the subsequent buses to each of the
the branches of the system. Two pointer arrays mfs and mts are
also introduced to point to the start and end memory locations
in sb array. The arrays mfs, mts, nsb and sb can be formed
from the input data of a RDN. MATLAB codes to form all the
proposed arrays from the input data are presented in [10]. The
general storage and pointer operations of these arrays are
explained in Fig.3 and Fig.4 with reference to a fictious RDN
of nb buses and nbr branches.
Fig.3. Storage and pointer operation of mf, mt and adb arrays
C. FBS based DSLF
FBS based DSLF is a well established method. This
method exploits the various topological specialties of the RDN
and is quite fast as well as simple to implement. This is an
iterative method and each iteration consists of two steps. In the
first step, starting from any end bus the RDN branch currents
are gradually calculated till the substation bus or the root bus.
This is termed as a “backward sweep”. In the second step i.e
forward sweep, starting from the substation bus all subsequent
buses up to the end buses are updated using (1). This equation
uses the previously calculated branch currents in the backward
sweep. This process continues till voltage magnitudes
converge. The current in any branch of a RDN can be
calculated using (3).
I i = Current of 'i ' th branch= ∑ ILi
i = all subsequent (3)
buses to j
A complete flow chart of the FBS based DSLF using the
proposed bus identification scheme is presented in Fig.5.
III. MODELING OF DGS FOR DSLF
Distributed Generation (DG) is an electric active power
source connected directly to the distribution network or
customer side of the meter [11]. However, DG is not a new
concept but it is an emerging approach for providing electric
power in the heart of the power system [4]. It encompasses
several technologies which can be broadly categorized as
renewable or nonrenewable. Renewable DG includes small
hydro plants, wind turbines, photo voltaic cells, fuel cells,
geothermal power plants, biomass power plants, tidal power
plants, wave power plants etc., whereas non renewable
category includes conventional fossil fuel based generators,
micro turbines, CHP plants etc. In this context, a broader term
such as Distributed Energy Resources(DER) can be defined,
which refers to the electric power generation resources that are
directly connected to the medium voltage(MV) or low voltage
(LV) distribution systems and it includes both generation units
IEEE International Conference on R e c e n t A d v a n c e s a n d I n n o v a t i o n s i n E n g i n e e r i n g ( I C R A I E - 2 0 1 4 ) ,
May 09-11, 2014, Jaipur India
(DGs) and energy storage technologies like batteries, fly A. PQ Model of DGs
wheels, super conducting magnetic energy storage etc. [12]. Since DGs are normally smaller in size when compared
with the conventional power sources, the constant PQ model is
commonly found to be sufficient for the distribution system
load flow analysis [17]. This model is adequate because DGs
typically not permitted to regulate the voltage. Instead, they
regulate power and power factor, hence modeled as negative
loads [8]. Most of the DGs are equipped with automatic
voltage regulators (AVR) and operate in constant power output
mode. Therefore, voltage output level of the DGs are same as
system voltage. Hence, it is preferable to handle the
interconnection nodes of DGs as the PQ node model rather
than the PV node model as shown in Fig.6 [18].

Fig.6. The models of load and DG as their power factor

B. FBS based Load Flow with DG Units

With DGs modeled as negative loads, the equivalent loads
at bus-i can be expressed as:
Pi = PLi − Pgi (4-a)

Qi = QLi − Qgi (4-b)

PLi and QLi are the constant power loads connected at bus -i
and Pgi and Qgi are the real and reactive powers injected by the
DG connected at bus-i respectively. The ECIs then can be
calculated at all the buses using (2). The backward and forward
sweeps are then followed as per the flow chart in Fig.5 to
execute the load flow.

C. Test Distribution Systems with DG Units

Three test distribution systems are considered to validate
the model and the method described in this paper. Fig.7 shows
a 12 bus radial test system with DGs connected at bus -6 and
Fig.5. Flow chart of DSLF 12 and the system data is presented in Table-I. Fig.8 shows the
One of the challenges [8] considering DG in the analysis second test radial distribution system of 33 bus [19] and DGs
and design of distribution systems, is the power flow solution are connected at bus 5 and 18. Pg and Qg of these DGs (both
taking into account the proper modeling of embedded DGs. test systems) are considered to be 10% and 7% of total active
Teng [13] has proposed three types of mathematical models of power and reactive power load of the corresponding system
DGs for load flow analysis i.e a) constant power factor model respectively. The third test distribution system is a 69 bus
for synchronous generator and power electronics based DGs radial system [20-21] with six DGs connected at bus-11, 22,
b) variable reactive power model for induction generator based 31, 38, 53 and 58 as shown in Fig.9.
DGs and c) constant voltage model for large scale
controllable DGs. Depending on the control, the DG may be set
to output power at either constant power factor for small DG or
constant voltage for large DG. Thus, two types of DG models
need to be developed: constant PQ modeled as negative loads
with currents injecting into the node and PV nodes [14]. The
model of DGs as PV or PQ depends on its operational mode
and control characteristics [15]. In reference [16], three models
DGs i.e a) induction generator model b) synchronous generator
Fig.7. 12 bus test distribution system
model and c) power electronics interfaces, are presented.
IEEE International Conference on R e c e n t A d v a n c e s a n d I n n o v a t i o n s i n E n g i n e e r i n g ( I C R A I E - 2 0 1 4 ) ,
May 09-11, 2014, Jaipur India

Fig.9. 69 bus test distribution system

TABLE II. 12-BUS SYSTEM LOAD FLOW RESULTS
Conv. volt.. mag. (p.u)
Bus no.
Without DG With DGs
2 0.9943 0.9954
3 0.9890 0.9913
4 0.9806 0.9849
5 0.9699 0.9773
6 0.9666 0.9751
7 0.9638 0.9729
8 0.9529 0.9647
9 0.9497 0.9625
10 0.9469 0.9610
11 0.9460 0.9608
12 0.9458 0.9611

Fig.8. 33 bus test distribution system

IV. RESULT AND DISCUSSION

The proposed DSLF algorithm is implemented in
MATLAB (R2010a) and simulated in a 2.4GHz Intel Core i3 Fig.10. Voltage profiles of 12 bus test distribution system
system with 2GB RAM. Convergence tolerance is considered
as .0001p.u. The converged voltage magnitudes for 12 bus
test system is presented in Table-II. The voltage profiles for the
three test distribution systems (with and without DGs) are
shown in Fig. 10, 11 and 12. Number of iterations, execution
times and overall real power losses for the three test
distribution systems are presented in Table-III.

TABLE I. 12-BUS SYSTEM DATA

Fig.11. Voltage profiles of 33 bus test distribution system
SE RE Br. r x P Q
Bus Bus No. (Ω) (Ω) (kW) (kVAR)
1 2 1 1.0890 0.4598 60 60
2 3 2 1.1858 0.4961 40 30
3 4 3 2.0933 0.8712 55 55
4 5 4 3.1823 1.3310 30 30
5 6 5 1.0890 0.4598 20 15
6 7 6 1.0043 0.4114 55 55
7 8 7 5.6386 1.5972 45 45
8 9 8 2.0933 0.8712 40 40
9 10 9 2.8919 0.8228 35 30
10 11 10 1.5125 0.4235 40 30
11 12 11 1.2342 0.3509 15 15 Fig.12. Voltage profiles of 69 bus test distribution system
IEEE International Conference on R e c e n t A d v a n c e s a n d I n n o v a t i o n s i n E n g i n e e r i n g ( I C R A I E - 2 0 1 4 ) ,
May 09-11, 2014, Jaipur India
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