Distributed power flow and distributed optimization—Formulation, solution, and open source implementation

Solving the power flow problem in a distributed fashion empowers different grid operators to compute overall state without having share models—this is practical which industry does not have off-the-shelf answers. We propose two physically consistent formulations (a feasibility and least-squares formulation) amenable solution methods from optimization: Alternating direction method of multipliers (admm), Augmented Lagrangian based Direction Inexact Newton (aladin); latter comes with convergence guarantees. In addition, we provide open source matlab code for rapid prototyping (rapidpf): fully matpower-compatible software that facilitates laborious task formulating problems as optimization problems. Simulation results systems ranging 53 buses (with 3 regions) up 4662 5 show formulation solved aladin requires just about half dozen coordinating steps before solved.