A PARALLEL LOAD FLOW ALGORITHM

This paper presents a parallel load flow algorithm employing the fast decoupled method. The algorithm transforms the problem's matrices into block diagonal form which is analogous to parsing the network into a number of independent clusters connected through tie lines. It modifie s the clusters' matrices to account for the effect of cut lines in a m anner that produces nonsingular and well-conditioned matrices. It uses existing efficient load flow programs with some modifications. The ap proach avoids problems associated with the parallel solution of highly sparse large linear systems of equations. Test results of standard sy stems and an existing 1177-bus system are included to illustrate the u sefulness of the algorithm and its viability in parallel processing im plementation.