A Scalable Multi-Agent System for Black Start Restoration in Low Voltage Microgrids

Abstract

The recent advances in automated control and decision making has resulted in well-organized power systems that are less susceptible to blackouts. Nevertheless, the presence of restoration processes is still essential and should follow the trend of automated decision making and control. To this end, this paper presents a Multi Agent System (MAS) focused to provide two restoration processes, namely Voltage & Frequency restoration and Black Start optimal sequence re-connection of Distributed Energy Resources (DERs) and loads. MAS is capable of operating on either semi-centralised or distributed control modes making the system resilient against Single Point of Failure (SPOF). The system is evaluated in a simulated low-voltage Microgrid developed in MATLAB/Simulink and the results demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed processes. Finally, empirical synthetic topologies are utilized to demonstrate the scalability of the black start process.