Phase shifter coordination for optimal transmission capacity using particle swarm optimization

When several phase shifting transformers (PSTs) are installed in a meshed grid, the coordination of these devices has to be studied carefully. A poor coordination can lead to inefficient use of infrastructure or even to situations where the security of supply is no longer guaranteed. The goal of this paper is to study how PSTs can be controlled in order to obtain an optimal or near-optimal situation for a given system. The network of the Netherlands and Belgium is taken as a research case. Particle swarm optimization (PSO) is used for this purpose, a black-box optimization technique based on a population of points in the search space.