An Integrated Approach to Optimal Charging Scheduling of Electric Vehicles Integrated with Improved Medium-Voltage Network Reconfiguration for Power Loss Minimization

The uncoordinated integration of electric vehicles (EVs) severely deteriorates the operational performance of a distribution network. To optimize distribution network performance in an EV charging environment, this paper presents a two-stage optimization approach, which integrates coordinated EV charging with network reconfiguration. A formulation to minimize system power loss is presented, and an optimal solution is obtained using a binary particle swarm optimization algorithm. The proposed approach is tested on a modified IEEE 33-bus medium-voltage node test system, coupled with a low voltage distribution network. Results of the coordinated and uncoordinated EV charging are compared with those of the developed integrated approach, and the operational performance of the system is studied. The results show that the integration of network reconfiguration with coordinated EV charging significantly decreases network power losses and fairly improves voltage profile. Thus, the proposed strategy can lead to improved operational performance of the system while dealing with the growing penetration of EVs in the network.