Optimal allocation of phasor measurement units in distribution power systems

Phasor measurement unit (PMU) is deemed a pivotal tool in wide-area monitoring, protection, and control of power systems. The optimal allocation of PMUs has recently received more attention. In this paper, Binary Integer Programming (BIP) technique is proposed to optimally allocate PMUs in the power network keeping complete observability of the network and reducing the total numbers of PMUs. The proposed technique is tested and examined through different systems to investigate the effectiveness of BIP. Additionally, the BIP is compared with different techniques to verify its superiority and reveal the main contributions of BIP-based algorithms using different IEEE test systems. The proposed method shows an efficient technique while placing PMUs through direct, simple, and linear formulas regardless of the network scale or configuration; transmission, or distribution systems. Moreover, the whole process consumes the least time slots to hit the intended goal because of the problem formulating criteria.