A Fairness-Based Distributed Energy Coordination for Voltage Regulation in Distribution Systems

The rapid adoption of solar photovoltaic systems combined with falling prices of energy storage is paving the way for a future in which customers can supply their energy needs locally and export surplus power to the grid. However, regulated reverse power flow from multiple sites can cause multiple problems including overvoltage. Although active power curtailment is an effective way to mitigate problematic reverse power flow, it inherently penalizes customers at remote locations in radial feeders. In this paper, we present a fairness-based energy coordination strategy enabling customers to share the responsibility of voltage regulation in distribution systems. We consider multiple fairness schemes and demonstrate dividing the burden proportionally according to each customer's capacity. The fairness-based energy coordination problem is solved in a distributed fashion that enables robustness to partial grid outages and limits the data sharing across ownership boundaries. We demonstrate the proposed approach using a modified IEEE 13-bus test feeder and a test harness that wherein greedy customer-led controls introduce overvoltage conditions unless control actions are taken. Results confirm that the proposed approach can successfully mitigate overvoltage without locational favoritism. Introducing fairness increased the aggregate PV curtailment by 0.64 percentage points compared to a fairness-agnostic scheme.