A High-Speed Power Flow Method based on Equivalent Resistance for Realtime Simulators of MVDC Distribution Networks

Medium-voltage direct current (MVDC) distribution networks have garnered significant attention due to their ability to enhance power distribution in modern grids. To efficiently operate the networks, an energy management system (EMS) is required, and it is imperative to validate applications in the EMS under a realistic environment using real-time simulators with a high-speed network analysis engine for power flow. However, classical NR-based methods are not suitable as analytical engines for real-time simulators due to their prolonged computation times resulting from complex numerical calculations. For application to real-time simulators that require high-speed computational capabilities, this paper presents a fast power flow method based on equivalent resistance for real-time simulators of MVDC distribution networks. In the proposed method, the injected power at each node is transformed into an equivalent resistance enabling a direct circuit analysis for a simple resistive circuit based on Kirchhoff’s law, which reduces computation time significantly compared with the classical NR-based method. Case studies on various test systems demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method, which exhibits a high degree of accuracy and a high-speed computation capability when compared with the classical NR-based method.