High-Speed Voltage Control in Active Distribution Systems with Smart Inverter Coordination and Deep Reinforcement Learning

Abstract

The increasing penetration of renewable energy resources in distribution systems necessitates high-speed monitoring and control of voltage for ensuring reliable system operation. However, existing voltage control algorithms often make simplifying assumptions in their formulation, such as real-time availability of smart meter measurements (for monitoring), or real-time knowledge of every power injection information(for control).This paper leverages the recent advances made in highspeed state estimation for real-time unobservable distribution systems to formulate a deep reinforcement learning-based control algorithm that utilizes the state estimates alone to control the voltage of the entire system. The results obtained for a modified (renewable-rich) IEEE34-nodedistributionfeeder indicate that the proposed approach excels in monitoring and controlling voltage of active distribution systems.