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Yan Li, Xinshou Tian, Chao Liu, Yuanyuan Su
China Electric Power Research Institute
State Key Laboratory of Operation and Control of
Renewable Energy ˂ Storage Systems
Beijing, China
liyan@epri.sgcc.com.cn
Abstract—Currently the issue of renewable energy related
encourage policies, high penetration of renewable energy connect
to the distribution network would lead to increased voltage levels,
short circuit current increases, power supply reliability and
power quality deterioration and other problems are particularly
prominent. In the traditional distribution network, the uncertain
factors that affect the voltage optimization result are the
fluctuation of the load. The renewable energy integration
represented by wind power and PV power not only changes the
characteristics of the traditional distribution network power flow,
but also because of its power electronic converter connection,
making the distribution network voltage characteristics, whether
steady or transient have brought significant changes, and then
the distribution network voltage control has brought great
challenges. To maintain the distribution network voltage level,
how to set a reasonable control strategy for different renewable
energy network connection situation makes the voltage in the
distribution network be reasonably controlled and optimized to
become an urgent problem to be solved. In order to achieve
flexible control system supply voltage, improve the level of
reactive power operation, and meet the demand of power users
under the conditions of the initiative to network and renewable
energy power generation operation optimization and control. In
this paper, the voltage control problem of distribution network
under the condition of large-scale renewable energy integration is
studied. Firstly, the voltage characteristics of the distribution
network under the uncertainty of renewable energy output are
analyzed, and the voltage sensitivity analysis model of renewable
energy connect network is established. On this basis, put forward
renewable energy voltage control strategy, and finally a regional
distribution network system as a case to verify the proposed
method and strategy of correctness and effectiveness.
Keywords—voltage control; distribution network; renewable
energy integration
I. INTRODUCTION
The increasing proportion of integration renewable energy,
making the traditional distribution network faced many
challenges. Especially the issue of renewable energy related
encourage policies, high-permeability distributed PV power
distribution network would lead to increased voltage levels,
short circuit current increases, power supply reliability and
power quality deterioration and other problems are particularly
Prominent, will break the traditional distribution network
trend one-way radial power supply mode. In order to solve the
‹,(((
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Lisheng Li, Linli Zhang, Yong Sun, Jianxiu Li
State Grid Shandong Electric Power Research Institute
Jinan, Shandong, China
lls16@sina.com
above problems, the traditional distribution network has
gradually changed from passive mode to active mode, the
trend from the "one-way" to "multi-direction", showing more
complex "multi-source" features. The distribution network
needs to build a highly integrated information, communication,
control technology source - network - load coordinated
operation system, through the renewable energy and diversity
load effective monitoring and optimization of regulation, fully
absorb renewable energy to reduce the load peak and valley
difference, improve the operation efficiency of the power
network, to achieve the traditional distribution network to the
modern active distribution network upgrade. Renewable
energy integration, on the one hand, to improve the power
supply capacity of the distribution network. The other hand,
the randomness of its power to increase the instability of the
distribution network. Although the distribution network in the
planning and design using a higher capacity ratio, load
uncertainty and the existence of power supply bottlenecks still
make the load peak load loss during the inevitable
phenomenon, had to take the power cut buffer. Therefore, with
the active distribution network is maturing, the scientific
ability of its power supply flexibility in real-time assessment,
find and break through the bottleneck in power supply, in
order to improve the distribution network operation of the
economy, reliability and security.
In the traditional distribution network, the uncertain factors
that influence the voltage control result are the fluctuation of
the load. The renewable energy integration represented by
wind power and PV power not only changes the characteristics
of the traditional distribution network power flow, but also
because of its power electronic transformation the voltage of
distribution network makes the voltage characteristics both
steady and transient state bring significant change, and then
the voltage control of the distribution network to bring a great
challenge. To maintain the distribution network voltage level,
how to set a reasonable control for different renewable power
supply and grid conditions makes the voltage in the
distribution network be reasonably optimized to become an
urgent problem to be solved. Under the condition of satisfying
the load demand of the power users , take the initiative to grid
and renewable energy power generation operation
optimization and control, so as to achieve flexible control
system power supply voltage, improve the level of voltage
operation purposes. In this paper, the voltage control problem
 of distribution network under the condition of large-scale
renewable energy integration is studied. Firstly, the voltage
characteristics of the distribution network under the
uncertainty of renewable energy output are analyzed, and the
voltage sensitivity analysis model of renewable energy
connect network is established. On this basis, put forward
renewable energy voltage control strategy, and finally a
regional distribution network system as a case to verify the
proposed method and strategy of correctness and effectiveness.
II. VOLTAGE SENSITIVITY ANALYSIS OF RENEWABLE
ENERGY INTEGRATION IN DISTRIBUTION NETWORK
Sensitivity is a method of obtaining the sensitive of the
dependent variable to the independent variable by studying the
differential relationship in the physical quantity. According to
the size of the sensitivity to guide the selection of the control
unit and the input of the independent variable to control the
output of the dependent variable, and finally complete the
system optimization to maintain the stability of the system.
Sensitivity method in many areas of the power system has
been widely used, such as planning reactive power
compensation node to determine the system's static voltage
stability. Figure 1 shows the main wiring diagram of a typical
distribution network.
RE
On the n node for renewable energy and active and
reactive injection, active injection is PRE,n , reactive injection
is Q RE,n .
The voltage drop across each line can be derived from the
formula of the power system analysis. The voltage drop of the
n line is shown in the following equation:
PT,n Rn  QT,n X n
'U n =U n -U n-1 =- (1)
Un
Where the transmitted active and reactive power are given
by following equation:
­°PT,n =Pn +PLoss,n -PRE,n
® (2)
°̄Q T,n =Q n +Q Loss,n -Q RE,n
Since renewable energy integration only affects the line
transmission power before the connect point, there is no effect
on the transmission power of the line behind the connect point,
so it is necessary to distinguish between the transmission
power before and after the connect point. In the case of
changing the renewable energy PRE,n and Q RE,n , the
increment of the voltage drop in the n line is as follows:
w'U n w'U n
'  'U n  = P+ Q (3)
wP wQ
The maximum voltage change of the n node is the sum of
the increments of each line before node n, as shown in the
following equation:
n n
w'U i n
w'U i
Fig. 1. Schematic diagram of main wiring of typical distribution network 'U n = ¦ '  'U i  ¦ P+ ¦ Q (4)
i=1 i=1 wP i=1 wQ
The line arranged on the N nodes, the n node of the
The sensitivity of the n node voltage to the active injection
apparent power is Pn  jQn (n 1,2 ˜˜˜˜˜, N ) . Line terminal is given by the change of the voltage. The sensitivity of the
reactive injection is as follows:
voltage isU 0 , followed by the voltage of the n node in turn
U n (n 1, 2 ˜˜˜˜˜, N ) . The n-1 node and the n node are the n ­ n
w'U i
branch: °SP,n
°
¦
i=1 wP
P
® (5)
¾ The impedance is R n  jX n . °S w'U i
Q
¯°
Q ,n
wQ
¾ The active power loss is PLoss,n

¾ The reactive power loss is Q Loss,n . III. VOLTAGE CONTROL STRATEGY OF RENEWABLE ENERGY
INTEGRATION IN DISTRIBUTION NETWORK

¾ The active power in transmission on the line is PT,n .

A. Control the target and its function
¾ The reactive power in transmission on the line is Normally, the voltage fluctuation range required by the
distribution network should not exceed ± 10%. When the
Q T,n . voltage exceeds the specified range, the voltage regulation will
be carried out.

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 Here the definition of n-dimensional vector as a voltage
demand indicator, n is the number of network nodes, the
­° f i  SP,i  =Oi > U Demond @ ¬ªSP,i ¼º
® 
°¯g i  Q P,i  = 1-Oi  > U Demond @ ª¬SQ,i º¼
following equation:

U Demand = ª¬ U Demandˈ1 U Demand,2 Demand,n º

U Dema ¼ (6)
B. Voltage control strategy process
­0.9  U i U i  0.9 The efficiency of the regulation is determined by the
° voltage demand and the voltage sensitivity. The voltage
U Demand,i ® 0 0.9 d U i d 1.1 (7) sensitivity function is determined by constructing the function
°1.1  U U i ! 1.1 of multiplication. The voltage regulation with zero demand is
¯ i
zero, and the voltage is returned to the reasonable interval
Where the voltage demand value corresponding to the i after the regulation. Figure 2 shows the renewable energy
node is the i node voltage amplitude. The indicators reflect the connect distribution network voltage control strategy process.
deviation of the voltage at each node under the requirements
of the power system, and the minimum amount of voltage Establish electrical and wiring
models for distribution networks
required to meet the requirements.
In the voltage regulation, the greater the need for voltage Establishment of renewable energy
nodes or the greater the voltage sensitivity of the node to unit voltage regulation model
adjust the adjustment of the higher efficiency. At the same
time if the adjustment unit of active affected, adjustment the Calculate the voltage drop across
the distribution line
voltage in the process to minimize the impact on active power
output is needed. Therefore, the priority parameter is
introduced by the voltage and reactive power sensitivity
Obtained voltage sensitivity of Obtained voltage sensitivity of
function, the voltage active power function and the weighting each node under the renewable each node under the renewable
factor, and the unit of the required regulation is determined by energy reactive power injection energy active power injection
the value of the priority. The priority function is shown in the
following equation. The voltage and reactive power sensitivity
function and the voltage active sensitivity function are as
follows: Formed the factor matrix of the influence of each
renewable energy power injection on each node

Fi D fi  SP,i   E gi  SQ ,i    Combined with the voltage demand indicators

­° fi  SP,i  = > U Demond @ ª¬SP,i º¼

to calculate the amount of regulation

® 
¯°g i  Q P,i  = > U Demond @ ª¬SQ,i º¼
N
Y or N Adjust the output of
renewable energy units

Y
Where Fi is the priority function, control unit is
End
composed of the voltage and reactive power sensitivity
 
Fig. 2. Voltage control strategy process
function f i SP,i and the voltage active sensitivity function
As can be seen from Figure 2, the specific voltage control
g i  SQ ,i  . The weighting factor D and E the two different
sensitivities are connected. The change of the D and E 
value in different cases can determine the active value in the
voltage regulation and the priority of reactive power. In the
voltage regulation, if D  E the priority will be used to
reduce the voltage to a reasonable range of reactive power,
then active control also occupy a certain proportion, while
optimizing the voltage as much as possible to send active.
In order to use as much as possible in the voltage control
with reactive power, consider the introduction of the penalty
factor Oi , the analysis Oi can be set in the reactive
adjustment range is 0, when more than reactive adjustment
range, will become larger can usually be considered as 0.5
value.
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strategy is as follows:
(1) First of all, in the simulation software to establish the
study of the distribution network of electrical and wiring
simulation analysis model, mainly for reactive power and
voltage analysis.
(2) Secondly, the establishment of connect to the
distribution network of renewable energy generation unit
reactive voltage control model, such as fixed power factor
control, or constant voltage control and so on.
(3) Thirdly, analysis of renewable energy integration
before the entire distribution of reactive power and voltage
conditions, on the basis of analysis of renewable energy
integration after the reactive voltage.
 (4) Fourthly, according to the formula for renewable
energy connect to the nodes after the reactive power injection
and active injection voltage sensitivity.
(5) Fifthly, on this basis for each node and each renewable
energy connect point into the active and reactive power
generation voltage sensitivity factor matrix.
(6) Sixthly, to optimize the control strategy with the
voltage demand index and the formed objective function.
(7) Lastly, to re-calculate the distribution network voltage,
if not meet the requirements to continue to control, to re-
calculate(6).
IV. EXAMPLES AND ANALYSIS
For example, simulation of a typical 14 node radial power
grid, the voltage rating of 10kV, the specific wiring shown in
Figure 3.

Main Grid

PV Station

Main Transform

Transf
orm

Fig. 3. Power flow direction in distribution network

The distribution of the tidal current in the 10kV feed line 1.001
will change after the 1MW distributed PV power station is 1.000
connected at the end of the distribution network. After the
0.999
distributed PV system is not connected, the tidal current flows
Voltage (pu)

from the first end to the end. After the distributed PV system 0.998

integration, the tidal current flows from node 1 to node 9, node 0.997

14 flows to node 9, where the feeder segment between node 9 0.996

and node 14 exhibits a tidal current flow, with a tidal current 0.995

distribution as shown in Fig. In this paper, the influence of PV 0.994

power station integration on the voltage of each node on the

line is calculated. The results are shown in Fig4.

0.999

0.998
(b) After
0.997
Voltage (pu)

0.996 Fig. 4. Comparison of voltage control before and after optimization

0.995

0.994 It can be seen from the calculation results that the

0.993
renewable energy integration has a certain lifting effect on the
0.992
voltage of each node of the distribution network. After
optimization, the maximum voltage change of the node is
0.406%, which obviously plays an optimized role. Due to the
renewable energy is PV in example, PV power unit power
factor ahead of 0.95. In the analysis, reactive power can meet
the requirements of voltage regulation.
(a) Before

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 V. CONCLUSION
In this paper, the voltage control problem of the
distribution network under the condition of large-scale
renewable energy integration is studied. Based on the voltage
characteristic analysis of the distribution network under the
uncertainty of the renewable energy output, the voltage
sensitivity analysis of the renewable energy connect network
is established model. On this basis, put forward a large-scale
renewable energy voltage control strategy to verify the
proposed method and strategy of correctness and
effectiveness. The results show that under the given voltage
regulation target, give full play to the renewable energy power
plant reactive power control capacity, will be very beneficial
to the distribution network.
Acknowledgment
The work is sponsored by SGCC technology project
NY71-17-019 < Key Technologies Study on Voltage Reactive
Power Analysis and Available Power Supply Capability of
Active Distribution Networks with Large-scale Renewable
Energy and Electric Vehicle Charging Facilities Integration>.
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