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Droop control is a viable method for the operation of island DC microgrids in a decentralized architecture. This paper presents a mixed-integer conic optimization formulation for the design of generator droop control, comprising the parameters of a piecewise linear droop curve. The mixed-integer formulation originates from a stochastic optimization framework that considers several operating scenarios for finding the optimal design. The convexity of the mixed-integer problem continuous relaxation gives global optimality guarantees for the design problem. The paper presents computational results using a tight polyhedral approximation of the conic program, leading to a mixed-integer linear programming (MILP) problem that is solved using a state-of-the-art commercial solver. The results from the proposed approach are contrasted with both a classic linear droop control design and a recent piecewise linear formulation. The Monte-Carlo simulation results quantify the extent to which the MILP solution is superior in reducing voltage violations and power loss, and the degree to which the loss is close to that from a conic optimal power flow solution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The generator in generative adversarial networks (GANs) is driven by a discriminator to produce high-quality images through an adversarial game. At the same time, the difficulty of reaching a stable generator has been increased. This paper focuses on non-adversarial generative networks that are trained in a plain manner without adversarial loss. The given limited number of real images could be insufficient to fully represent the real data distribution. We therefore investigate a set of distributions in a Wasserstein ball centred on the distribution induced by the training data and propose to optimize the generator over this Wasserstein ball. We theoretically discuss the solvability of the newly defined objective function and develop a tractable reformulation to learn the generator. The connections and differences between the proposed non-adversarial generative networks and GANs are analyzed. Experimental results on real-world datasets demonstrate that the proposed algorithm can effectively learn image generators in a non-adversarial approach, and the generated images are of comparable quality with those from GANs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As one of the most widely installed utility-scale storage facilities, pumped storage hydro (PSH) plays an essential role in providing flexibility for power systems worldwide. Thus, to accurately quantify the flexibility of PSH units in operational optimization problems is important. The conventional PSH models in the literature rarely consider detailed state transitions due to their hourly-based settings. However, it becomes imperative for operational optimization on short-term intervals, especially with increasing shares of renewable energy in power systems. To this end, this paper presents a novel deterministic PSH model that considers the transition time and trajectory between three states of PSH units in look-ahead dispatch. Moreover, to better characterize the varying efficiency of PSH units with water head and flow rate, this paper proposes to model detailed head-dependent efficiency curves (hereafter called input-output curves) in look-ahead dispatch, which encounters heavy computational burdens when short time intervals are applied. In this work, a zig-zag piece-wise linear approximation method is used for input-output curve modeling. This can enable an accurate quantification for variable efficiency and head dependence in a computationally effective manner. Numerical results are presented to show performances of the proposed PSH model in both flexibility quantification and computation time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bulk integrated electricity and gas systems (IEGSs) introduce complex coupling relations and induce synergistic operation challenges. The growing uncertainty arising from the renewable power generation in the IEGS further aggravates the synergistic problems. Considering the availability of historical wind power generation data, this paper adopts a two-stage sample robust optimization (SRO) model, which is equivalent to the two-stage distributionally robust optimization (DRO) model with a ${\text{type}} - \infty $ Wasserstein ambiguity set, to address the wind power penetrated unit commitment optimal energy flow (UC-OEF) problem for the IEGS. Compared to the equivalent DRO model, the two-stage SRO model can be approximately transformed into a computationally efficient form. Specifically, we employ linear decision rules to simplify the proposed UC-OEF model. Moreover, we further enhance the tractability of the simplified model by exploring its structural features and, accordingly, develop a solution method. Simulation results on two IEGSs validate the effectiveness of the proposed model and solution method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This is a follow-up study of the cryogen-free superconducting prototype generator with YBCO field windings. The previous paper had introduced the design of the structure, cryogenic system and electromagnetic characteristics of the prototype machine, whose operating temperature was 30 K, maximum field current was 100 A and rotating speed was from 10 to 30 rpm. In this paper, the optimization of the airgap magnetic field and the stability of superconducting magnet have been carried out. For the purpose of increasing utilization of the magnetic field of superconducting windings, its support structure and vacuum chamber of the cryostat had been upgraded in order to reduce the physical airgap between the armature teeth and the vacuum chamber room temperature wall from 10 mm to 2 mm. In addition, a new coil curing method, vacuum impregnation process with paraffin, had been applied while the YBCO coil fabrication, to improve its stability. The performance properties of the optimized system as well as the comparison between FEM simulation and experimental results are finally presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The security-constrained optimal power flow (SCOPF) is fundamental in power systems and connects the automatic primary response (APR) of synchronized generators with the short-term schedule. Every day, the SCOPF problem is repeatedly solved for various inputs to determine robust schedules given a set of contingencies. Unfortunately, the modeling of APR within the SCOPF problem results in complex large-scale mixed-integer programs, which are hard to solve. To address this challenge, leveraging the wealth of available historical data, this paper proposes a novel approach that combines deep learning and robust optimization techniques. Unlike recent machine-learning applications where the aim is to mitigate the computational burden of exact solvers, the proposed method predicts directly the SCOPF implementable solution. Feasibility is enforced in two steps. First, during training, a Lagrangian dual method penalizes violations of physical and operations constraints, which are iteratively added as necessary to the machine-learning model by a Column-and-Constraint-Generation Algorithm (CCGA). Second, another different CCGA restores feasibility by finding the closest feasible solution to the prediction. Experiments on large test cases show that the method results in significant time reduction for obtaining feasible solutions with an optimality gap below 0.1%. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The volatility of renewable energy causes mismatch between real-time generation and demand, calling for sufficient backup to compensate such discrepancy. This paper studies the uncertainty mitigation problem at a given operating point, which entails correctively dispatching obligate generators to maintain power balancing and network power flow constraints. The redispatch problem is modeled via a convex quadratic program parameterized in the real-time renewable output, aiming at minimizing the weighted sum of square of generator incremental output. Such an objective leads to a proper allocation of unbalanced power among generators and ensures a unique optimal solution, therefore circumvents model degeneracy. Based on the first-order optimality condition, the analytical expression of the optimal redispatch policy is proven to be piecewise affine: the renewable output set is partitioned into polyhedral regions; in each region, the optimal redispatch policy of generator is an affine function in the incremental output of renewable plants. Provided with the optimal redispatch policy in the analytical form, the nodal-wise flexibility requirements on obligate generators, including the spinning reserve capacity and the ramping capability, can be easily assessed, which is useful in generation scheduling. Case studies on the PJM 5-bus system and the modified IEEE 118-bus system demonstrate the outcome and validate the effectiveness of the proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, remarkable progress in zero-shot learning (ZSL) has been achieved by generative adversarial networks (GAN). To compensate for the lack of training samples in ZSL, a surge of GAN architectures have been developed by human experts through trial-and-error testing. Despite their efficacy, however, there is still no guarantee that these hand-crafted models can consistently achieve good performance across diversified datasets or scenarios. Accordingly, in this paper, we turn to neural architecture search (NAS) and make the first attempt to bring NAS techniques into the ZSL realm. Specifically, we propose a differentiable GAN architecture search method over a specifically designed search space for zero-shot learning, referred to as ZeroNAS. Considering the relevance and balance of the generator and discriminator, ZeroNAS jointly searches their architectures in a min-max player game via adversarial training. Extensive experiments conducted on four widely used benchmark datasets demonstrate that ZeroNAS is capable of discovering desirable architectures that perform favorably against state-of-the-art ZSL and generalized zero-shot learning (GZSL) approaches. Source code is at https://github.com/caixiay/ZeroNAS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Under future low-carbon scenarios, it will be crucial to boost the rapidity in the delivery of frequency response services, especially those provided by conventional generators. This paper proposes a novel framework for the scheduling of frequency response services that incentivizes a rapid response from different system assets, including conventional generators. Differently from other approaches which envisage a fixed delivery time for frequency response services, the proposed methodology implements time-varying delivery intervals, which coincide with the time of frequency nadir occurrence. A relevant set of linearized constraints is embedded in a typical power system scheduling model. Results indicate that the proposed methodology reduces the unnecessary overscheduling associated with traditional methodologies, leading to significant operational cost savings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Linear droop control is a standard approach for the decentralized operation of AC microgrids. While the traditional design of the real and reactive power droop functions does not consider economic aspects, recent approaches present modifications to enable least-cost operation. This paper proposes mixed-integer conic programming (MICP) for computing the real and reactive power droop parameters from a stochastic optimization framework that captures several snapshots of the microgrid’s operation. The model permits distributed generation to switch between grid-forming and grid-feeding modes. Unlike previous works, MICP provides droop parameters that are globally optimal for the design scenarios. Numerical results show that using traditional linear cost-based droop design methods may result in voltage magnitude violations. In contrast, the proposed method gives a solution free of violations and is yet more economical. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Wind energy systems are expected to supply the majority of future generation from renewables due to the maturity of technology and the availability of energy resources. In this paper, in order to improve the ability of tracking a desired power reference at high wind speed region, a pitch control strategy based on error-based active disturbance rejection control (ADRC) approach is proposed for variable speed wind turbine system, providing a novel practically appealing control structure. The stability analysis of the proposed pitch controller based on singular perturbation theory is provided. Next, an improved coyote optimization algorithm (COA) fused with L $\rm {\acute{e}}$ vy flight and Sinusoidal map is proposed to address the controller parameters tuning issue. Then, the effectiveness of the proposed solution is verified on a 1.5 MW FAST simulator taking into account both multi-step and IEC turbulence wind conditions. Finally, an analysis in frequency domain of the pitch control system with the proposed control strategy is presented. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With theincreased penetration of renewable sources, power gridsare becoming stressed due to fluctuating generation. To alleviate stress from inconsistent sources, utilities employ energy storage systems alongside renewable sources and rely on dispatching synchronous generators. However, optimal dispatch of such devices is limited by traditional AC optimal power flow methods that do not account for time-dependent constraints, such as the state of charge of energy storage systems and generator ramping constraints. Multi-period optimal power flow is proposed as a large non-convex non-linear problem to optimally dispatch and control generators and energy storage elements across multiple time periods. In this paper, we introduce a scalable, robust framework to solve multi-period optimal power flow using a differential dynamic programming scheme that makes it capable of scaling to large systems containing energy storage devices. We demonstrate the efficacy of this solution by optimizing the SyntheticUSA testcase over a set of time periods. A robust homotopy method is applied to achieve fast simulation times that can be parallelized for further improvements. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Uncertainty arising from renewable energy results in considerable challenges in optimal power flow (OPF) analysis. Various chance-constrained approaches are proposed to address the uncertainty within OPF models. However, most existing approaches either assume that the uncertainty distributions are known a priori or consider individual chance constraint modeling. This paper proposes a distributionally robust (DR) joint chance-constrained OPF model, which ensures that the operational constraints are simultaneously satisfied with a given probability and does not require an assumption of specific probability distributions. An ambiguity set built on the first two moments is used to model the uncertainty. An optimized Bonferroni approximation (OBA) is first introduced to decompose the DR joint chance constraint into DR individual chance constraints. The resulting OBA formulation is strongly nonconvex. Different convex approximations are then proposed to formulate the OBA formulation as tractable forms. The proposed convex approximations can be easily extended to incorporate the structural information associated with uncertainty, and correlations among reserve chance constraints. Case studies demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed convex approximation methods and their extensions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The output of renewable generation depends on the real-time weather conditions and changes rapidly; so the economic operating point of the power system varies over time. This paper aims to find the explicit mapping from variable renewable power to optimal power flow solutions. To this end, we propose a parametric distribution optimal power flow (P-DOPF) method, which gives the optimal dispatch strategy and power flow status as analytical functions of the renewable output. With the established distribution optimal power flow problem based on the relaxed Distflow model, the first step is to perform a global polyhedral approximation on the second-order cone constraints to develop a linearized formulation. The second step is to obtain the P-DOPF model by treating renewable power output as parameters; then, the P-DOPF problem gives rise to a multi-parametric linear program (mp-LP). Third, we prove that the optimal solution and optimal value of the P-DOPF are piecewise linear functions of the parameters and we design an adaptive-sampling algorithm to construct the optimal value and optimal solution functions, as well as the partition of the parameter set, subject to a given error tolerance; this algorithm is not influenced by model degeneracy, a common difficulty of existing mp-LP algorithms. The P-DOPF framework provides an explicit real-time control policy of generators in response to the renewable output. Case studies on the IEEE 33 and 69-bus systems verify the effectiveness and performance of the proposed method; by comparison, the proposed method outperforms the established affine policy method in computational efficiency and optimality by 24.5% and 4.62%, respectively. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The utilization of aggregated demand-side flexibility via demand response (DR) has become a promising pathway for the integration of renewable energy resources in power systems. Nowadays, there are several management strategies for DR such as the price-based transactive control strategies. However, many of such existing price-based control strategies neglect the physics and operational constraints of the underlying distribution networks when computing the price, raising concerns regarding their theoretical and practical values. This paper studies this issue and investigates optimal DR (ODR) by incorporating the distribution locational marginal price (DLMP). In particular, we discuss DR in connection with DLMPs and propose a multi-period bilevel optimization problem to find the ODR strategy. The objective is to minimize the peak load, load fluctuation, and payments of load aggregators. In addition, a robust bilevel ODR model is formulated to provide a robust ODR strategy while minimizing operating costs under the worst-case realization of uncertainties; this mitigates the impact of forecasting errors on renewable energy resources. Then, we propose an efficient solution approach by employing the Karush-Kuhn-Tucker conditions and strong duality. Simulation results are presented to illustrate the mutual impacts of the interaction between DR and DLMP and the benefits of the robust ODR strategy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we propose a parallel dual dynamic programming (PDDP)-based decentralized algorithm for the multi-area optimal power flow (MAOPF), which can preserve the information privacy and operational independence of each area. The MAOPF problem is decomposed into a series of subproblems for individual areas by the dual dynamic programming (DDP) algorithm, and the Benders cut-based value functions are used to reflect the impacts of one area’s decisions to the subsequent areas. The optimal solution of MAOPF can be obtained in a decentralized fashion, requiring only a limited amount of information exchange among neighbor areas. Moreover, a parallel processing technique is designed to avoid the waiting process of the basic DDP algorithm, thus accelerating the computing speed of the proposed decentralized algorithm. Compared with the existing decentralized algorithms, the proposed algorithm has better performance in terms of convergence and computational efficiency. In addition, there is no need for parameter tuning. Case studies on several IEEE test systems and a real 2298-bus system demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a holistic framework of data-driven distributionally robust joint chance constrained economic dispatch (ED) optimization, which seamlessly incorporates deep learning-based optimization for effective utilization of renewable energy in power systems. By leveraging a deep generative adversarial network (GAN), an f-divergence-based ambiguity set of wind power distributions is constructed as a ball centered around the probability distribution induced by a generator neural network. In particular, the GAN is well suited for capturing complicated spatial and temporal correlations of wind power. Based upon this ambiguity set, a distributionally robust joint chance constrained ED model is developed to hedge against distributional uncertainty present in multiple constraints, without assuming a perfectly known probability distribution. The proposed deep learning based ED optimization framework greatly mitigates the conservatism inflicting on distributionally robust individual chance constrained optimization. Theoretical a priori bound on the required number of synthetic wind power data generated by GAN is explicitly derived for the multi-period ED problem to guarantee a predefined risk level. The effectiveness and scalability of the proposed approach are demonstrated in the six-bus and IEEE 118-bus systems by comparing with the state-of-the-art methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With Europe dedicated to limiting climate change and greenhouse gas emissions, large shares of Renewable Energy Sources (RES) are being integrated in the national grids, phasing out conventional generation. The new challenges arising from the energy transition will require a better coordination between neighboring system operators to maintain system security. To this end, this paper studies the benefit of exchanging primary frequency reserves between asynchronous areas using the Supplementary Power Control (SPC) functionality of High-Voltage Direct-Current (HVDC) lines. First, we focus on the derivation of frequency metrics for asynchronous AC systems coupled by HVDC interconnectors. We compare two different control schemes for HVDC converters, which allow for unilateral or bilateral exchanges of reserves between neighboring systems. Second, we formulate frequency constraints and include them in a unit commitment problem to ensure the N-1 security criterion. A data-driven approach is proposed to better represent the frequency nadir constraint by means of cutting hyperplanes. Our results suggest that the exchange of primary reserves through HVDC can reduce up to 10% the cost of reserve procurement while maintaining the system N-1 secure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, considering the oceanic multiple degree of freedom motion, a double stator linear-rotary permanent magnet (DSLRPM) generator with Halbach PM array is proposed for direct drive ocean energy conversion. It focuses on the power maximization generation resulting in a highly optimized DSLRPM generator to improve the generated power of the ocean energy conversion system in complex ocean condition. Based on the power-oriented design concept, the whole design process is divided into two steps. In the initial design procedure, the operating domain design is conducted, and the design point is selected. In the optimization design procedure, the non-dominated sorting genetic algorithm II (NSGA-II) coupled with response surface methodology (RSM) and sensitivity analysis is proposed to be as an optimization design technique. Finally, a prototype based on the optimized results is manufactured. The experimental results agree with the simulated result, and they both reveal that the proposed method can offer an effective design and optimization for the DSLRPM generator, where the multiple oceanic motions and complex operating conditions are considered. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

As for Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs), its interpretability may be closely related to optimization objective functions, that is, information metrics play important roles in networks training and data generation. In terms of original GAN, the objective function based on Kullback-Leibler (KL) divergence has limitations on the performance of data training and generation. Therefore, it is significant to investigate objective functions for the optimization in GANs to bring gains on the efficiency of network learning from the perspective of metrics. In this paper, the objective function with exponential form, referred from the Message Importance Measure (MIM), is adapted to replace that with logarithm form in the optimization for adversarial networks. This approach named MIM-based GAN, may provide more hidden information in terms of interpretability on training process and probability events generation. Specifically, we first analyze the intrinsic relationship between the proposed approach and other classical GANs. Moreover, compared with the original GAN, LSGAN and WGAN, we discuss its advantages on training performance in theory including sensitivity, convergence rate and so on. In addition, we do simulations on the datasets to confirm why the MIM-based GAN achieves state-of-the-art performance on training process and data generation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Chance-constrained economic dispatch (CCED) is widely used to cope with uncertainties brought by renewable energy sources. In CCED, security of power system is guaranteed by restricting risks under permitted level. As the penetration rate of renewable energy increases rapidly, the CCED model may be infeasible because of inadequate system reserve and/or transmission congestion under certain circumstances. Therefore, the curtailment of renewable energy is indispensable to guarantee security in some scenarios for power systems with high penetration of renewable energy. To address this crucial issue, this paper proposes a novel CCED model, where generation of conventional units and curtailment strategies of renewable energy are co-optimized to minimize total operational cost and restrict operational risks. An efficient solution method is developed to schedule generation and curtailment sequentially, in which tractable optimization models are formulated for each step. Numerical tests demonstrate that the proposed model can significantly reduce the probability of emergency control of curtailment compared with conventional CCED models. Furthermore, this solution method also outperforms scenario-based method with significantly improved computational efficiency and higher-quality solution. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Appropriately designed renewable support policies can play a leading role in promoting renewable expansions and contribute to low emission goals. Meanwhile, ill-designed policies may distort electricity markets, put power utilities and generation companies on an unlevel playing field and, in turn, cause inefficiencies. This paper proposes a framework to optimize policymaking for renewable energy sources, while incorporating conflicting interests and objectives of different stakeholders. We formulate a tri-level optimization problem where each level represents a different entity: a state regulator, a power utility and a wholesale electricity market. To solve this tri-level problem, we exploit optimality conditions and develop a modification of the Column-and-Cut Generation (C&CG) algorithm that generates cuts for bilinear terms. The case study based on the ISO New England 8-zone test system reveals different policy trade-offs that policymakers face under different decarbonization goals and implementation scenarios. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper proposes a data-driven chance-constrained optimal gas-power flow (OGPF) calculation method without any prior assumption on the distribution of uncertainties of wind power generation. The Gaussian mixture model is employed to fit the uncertainty distribution, where the Bayesian nonparametric Dirichlet process is adopted to tune the component number. To facilitate the online application of the proposed methods, an online-offline double-track distribution construction approach is established, where the frequency of training the relatively time-consuming Dirichlet process Gaussian mixture model can be reduced. On account of the quadratic gas consumption expression of gas-fired generators as well as the linear decision rule based uncertainty mitigation mechanism, the chance constraints would become quadratic ones with quadratic terms of uncertainties, which makes the proposed model more intractable. An equivalent linear separable counterpart is then provided for the quadratic chance constraints, after which the intractable chance constraints could be converted into traditional linear ones. The convex-concave procedure is used to crack the nonconvex Weymouth equation in the gas network and the auxiliary quadratic equalities. Simulation results on two test systems validate the effectiveness of the proposed methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the large-scale integration of distributed generators (DGs), the coupling relations between transmission network (TN) and distribution networks (DNs) are getting closer. Coordinating the black-start processes of TN and DNs is beneficial to improving restoration efficiency. Therefore, a distributed black-start optimization method for global transmission and distribution (T&D) network is proposed in this paper. Firstly, a black-start optimization model of global T&D network is established to minimize the outage costs. Then, it is decomposed into the TN black-start optimization sub-problem and several DN black-start optimization sub-problems based on the analytical target cascading (ATC). The mixed integer quadratic programming (MIQP) is used for sub-problem modeling. The models take into account the restoration operations of different grid components at each black-start time step. The transmission control center (TCC) and distribution control centers (DCCs) only need to exchange partial information including the boundary power at each time step for distributed coordination, to obtain the coordinated black-start scheme for T&D network. Finally, the effectiveness of the proposed model and method is validated using a global T&D network case. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Modern mixed-integer quadratic solvers generally handle binary variables more efficiently than nonlinear mixed-integer solvers. This is relevant to the power system operation models as the unit commitment formulations typically contain a large number of binary variables. This paper investigates how to achieve the accuracy level close to the one of the exact nonlinear models, but by utilising convex models and solvers. The presented unit commitment model is based on a Taylor-series expansion where both the voltage magnitude and angle are quadratically constrained. To achieve high accuracy, the model takes advantage of the meshed transmission network structure that enables replacement of the quadratic inequality constraints that cause constraint relaxation errors with the linear equality constraints. Quadratic constraints to be replaced as well as the operating point parameters are determined based on the presolve. The first presented case study validates the model's accuracy and the convergence of the iterative algorithm, while the second is a non-iterative full unit commitment problem. Unit commitment results show superior accuracy and similar computation times to the existing quadratic formulations on one hand and faster computation times than the exact nonlinear polar formulation on the other. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Multi-interval or dynamic economic dispatch (D-ED) is the core of various power system management functions. This optimization problem contains many constraints, a small subset of which is sufficient to enclose the D-ED feasible region. This paper presents a topology-aware learning-aided iterative constraint screening algorithm to identify a feasibility outlining subset of network and generating units ramp up/down constraints and create a truncated D-ED problem. We create a colorful image from nodal demand, thermal unit generation cost, and network topology information. Convolutional neural networks are trained for constraint status identification using colorful images corresponding to system operating conditions and transfer learning. Filtering inactive line flow and ramp up/down constraints reduces the optimization problem's size and computational burden, resulting in a reduction in solution time and memory usage. Dropping all inactive branch and ramp constraints may activate some of these originally inactive constraints upon solving the truncated D-ED. A loop is added to form a constraints coefficient matrix iteratively during training dataset preparation and algorithm utilization. This iterative loop guarantees truncated D-ED results feasibility and optimality. Numerical results show the proposed algorithm's effectiveness in constraint status prediction and reducing D-ED size and solution time. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While existing watermarking attack methods can disturb the correct extraction of watermark information, the visual quality of watermarked images will be greatly damaged. Therefore, a concealed attack based on generative adversarial network and perceptual losses for robust watermarking is proposed. First, the watermarked image is utilized as the input of generative networks, and its generating target (i.e. attacked watermarked image) is the original image. Inspired by the U-Net network, the generative networks consist of encoder-decoder architecture with skip connection, which can combine the low-level and high-level information to ensure the imperceptibility of the generated image. Next, to further improve the imperceptibility of the generated image, instead of the loss function based on MSE, a perceptual loss based on feature extraction is introduced. In addition, a discriminative network is also introduced to make the appearance and distribution of generated image similar to those of the original image. The addition of the discriminative network can remove watermark information effectively. Extensive experiments are conducted to verify the feasibility of the proposed concealed attack method. Experimental and analysis results demonstrate that the proposed concealed attack method has better imperceptibility and attack ability in comparison to the existing watermarking attack methods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the increasing penetration of renewable energy (RE), the operations of distribution network are threatened and some issues may appear, i.e., large voltage deviation, deterioration of statistic voltage stability, high power loss, etc. In turn, RE accommodation would be significantly impacted. Therefore, we propose a many-objective distribution network reconfiguration (MDNR) model, with the consideration of RE curtailment, voltage deviation, power loss, statistic voltage stability, and generation cost. This aims to assess the trade-off among these objectives for better operations of distribution networks. As the proposed model is a non-convex, non-linear, many-objective optimization problem, it is difficult to be solved. We further propose a deep reinforcement learning (DRL) assisted multi-objective bacterial foraging optimization (DRL-MBFO) algorithm. This algorithm combines the advantages of DRL and MBFO, and is targeted to find the Pareto front of proposed MDNR model with better searching efficiency. Finally, we conduct case study on the modified IEEE 33-bus, 69-bus, and 118-bus power distribution systems, and results verify the effectiveness of the MDNR model and outperformance of the proposed DRL-MBFO. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article proposes a two-stage optimization algorithm to effectively determine the system configuration at one stage, as well as the capacity of components at the other stage in the middle of the former. This algorithm fits in best with the hybrid systems with more possible types of components. The studied system, in this article, includes diesel generators, wind turbines, photovoltaic arrays, and tidal generators as the power generation components, as well as battery banks and flywheels as the energy storage components. It also includes fuel cells and electrolyzers that either work as batteries or generate electricity in the presence of biomass. When the number of components (decision variables) increases, it becomes difficult to find an optimal solution by the conventional methods. Therefore, in this study, a two-stage multiobjective optimization algorithm is applied to design a cost effective and environmental friendly ac minigrid hybrid power system. In each iteration of the proposed algorithm, first, renewable energy sources and energy storage components are selected to form a hybrid power system along with the diesel generator. Then, the capacities of the components are optimized based on the two objective functions, including levelized cost of electricity and emissions. The optimization model uses real annual data in hourly time intervals for the load, solar insolation, ambient temperature, and wind speed. It is found that the proposed algorithm decreases the susceptibility of the solutions to multiple runs compared with the conventional algorithms and achieves a better optimized power system design. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The increased penetration of wind power introduces more operational changes of critical corridors and the traditional time-consuming transient stability constrained total transfer capability (TTC) operational planning is unable to meet the real-time monitoring need. This paper develops a more computationally efficient approach to address that challenge via the analytical deep learning-based surrogate model. The key idea is to resort to deep learning for developing a computationally cheap surrogate model to replace the original time-consuming differential-algebraic constraints related to TTC. However, the deep learning-based surrogate model introduces implicit rules that are difficult to handle in the optimization process. To this end, we derive the Jacobian and Hessian matrices of the implicit surrogate models and finally transfer them into an analytical formulation that can be easily solved by the interior point method. Surrogate modeling and problem reformulation allow us to achieve significantly improved computational efficiency and the yielded solutions can be used for operational planning. Numerical results carried out on the modified IEEE 39-bus and 68-bus systems demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed method in dealing with complicated TTC constraints while balancing the computational efficiency and accuracy. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, we consider a class of decentralized resource allocation problems over directed networks, where each node only communicates with its in-neighbors and attempts to minimize its own cost when network-wide resource constraints as well as local capacity limits are satisfied. Decentralized optimization to solve this problem has been a significant focus within engineering research due to its advantages in scalability, robustness, and flexibility. Most existing methods are synchronous while few works are devoted to asynchronously solving the problem. The problem becomes even more challenging when the networks are directed. To address the resource allocation problem when the above issues are considered, we propose a novel decentralized asynchronous algorithm based on the gossip-based communication protocol and epigraph strategy. An important feature of the algorithm is that it is implemented in a completely decentralized manner in the case of asynchronous communication and directed networks. We provide theoretical proof to guarantee the convergence of the proposed algorithm, which indicates that it can successfully allocate the optimal resource. When solving the resource allocation problem over time-varying directed networks, we further discuss a related decentralized asynchronous algorithm according to the random sleep protocol. Numerical examples are given to demonstrate the viability and performance of the algorithms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A linear and convex model has been recently presented for the operation of battery energy storage units that does not explicitly prevent their simultaneous charge and discharge in the problem formulation. This letter claims that the model in such a literature contribution is capable of ensuring the physical realizability of the battery dispatch only when nondiscrete decisions are considered in the optimization problem. This claim is demonstrated through the solution of two instances of a simple unit-commitment-based example comprising two generating units, one battery energy storage unit, and two time periods. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Face Anti-Spoofing (FAS) plays an increasingly important role in face recognition systems for preventing malicious attacks. Existing FAS methods usually show poor generalization performance due to the large difference of domain information (such as collection environment, collection equipment, etc.) between the training set and the testing set. Therefore, we consider training a FAS network that does not pay attention to domain information, in this way to extract relevant liveness feature for the task of FAS. Learned from adversarial learning and disentanglement learning, we design the Domain Adversarial Disentanglement Network with Cross-Domain Synthesis (DADN-CDS) for Face Anti-Spoofing, which achieves disentanglement between domain-irrelevant liveness feature and domain-related feature, so as to minimize the effect of domain information in the needed representation that is used for inference. Specifically, DADN-CDS proposes a dual-branch architecture that can explicitly model and separate out the domain information. To achieve targeted optimization for each component, a novel Task-oriented Three-step Update Strategy (TTUS) is designed to explore a better model update method. Irrelevant loss and 2N-Pair Cross-Domain Loss in TTUS further ensure the disentanglement and task-oriented optimization. Moreover, an Attention-based Cross Synthesis Module (ACSM) is elaborately devised to obtain higher-quality synthetic feature, which performs attention-based feature fusion in a channel-wise way. The design of ACSM can help verify and implicitly facilitate the disentanglement process. Extensive experiments demonstrate that our method achieves the state-of-the-art performance on public datasets and results also suggest the generalization ability of our proposed method. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Bilinear models such as low-rank and dictionary methods, which decompose dynamic data to spatial and temporal factor matrices are powerful and memory-efficient tools for the recovery of dynamic MRI data. Current bilinear methods rely on sparsity and energy compaction priors on the factor matrices to regularize the recovery. Motivated by deep image prior, we introduce a novel bilinear model, whose factor matrices are generated using convolutional neural networks (CNNs). The CNN parameters, and equivalently the factors, are learned from the undersampled data of the specific subject. Unlike current unrolled deep learning methods that require the storage of all the time frames in the dataset, the proposed approach only requires the storage of the factors or compressed representation; this approach allows the direct use of this scheme to large-scale dynamic applications, including free breathing cardiac MRI considered in this work. To reduce the run time and to improve performance, we initialize the CNN parameters using existing factor methods. We use sparsity regularization of the network parameters to minimize the overfitting of the network to measurement noise. Our experiments on free-breathing and ungated cardiac cine data acquired using a navigated golden-angle gradient-echo radial sequence show the ability of our method to provide reduced spatial blurring as compared to classical bilinear methods as well as a recent unsupervised deep-learning approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs) are formulated as minimax game problems that generative networks attempt to approach real data distributions by adversarial learning against discriminators which learn to distinguish generated samples from real ones, of which the intrinsic problem complexity poses challenges to performance and robustness. In this work, we aim to boost model learning from the perspective of network architectures, by incorporating recent progress on automated architecture search into GANs. Specially we propose a fully differentiable search framework, dubbed alphaGAN, where the searching process is formalized as solving a bi-level minimax optimization problem. The outer-level objective aims for seeking an optimal network architecture towards pure Nash Equilibrium conditioned on the network parameters of generators and discriminators optimized with a traditional adversarial loss within inner level. The entire optimization performs a first-order approach by alternately minimizing the two-level objective in a fully differentiable manner that enables obtaining a suitable architecture efficiently from an enormous search space. Extensive experiments on CIFAR-10 and STL-10 datasets show that our algorithm can obtain high-performing architectures only with 3-GPU hours on a single GPU in the search space comprised of approximate $2\times 10^{11}$ 2 × 10 11 possible configurations. We further validate the method on the state-of-the-art network StyleGAN2, and push the score of Fréchet Inception Distance (FID) further, i.e., achieving 1.94 on CelebA, 2.86 on LSUN-church and 2.75 on FFHQ, with relative improvements $3\%{\sim} 26\%$ 3 % ∼ 26 % over the baseline architecture. We also provide a comprehensive analysis of the behavior of the searching process and the properties of searched architectures, which would benefit further research on architectures for generative models. Codes and models are available at https://github.com/yuesongtian/AlphaGAN. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Transmission system operators (TSOs) are increasingly requesting frequency support, reactive power compensation, and grid-forming capability to power plants interfaced by power converters. In these plants, a large number of converters is operated in parallel and all of them should be adequately coordinated to provide these services. For that purpose, the virtual synchronous machine (VSM) control technique is commonly adopted. However, the dynamic characteristics of the whole plant depend on the number of converters connected, their size, control parameters, and electrical interconnections. This makes it difficult to know the aggregated dynamic characteristic of the plant and how each VSM contributes to the plant response. In this article, the operation of VSMs in parallel configuration for island and grid-connected applications is studied. The developments make it possible to adapt the VSMs parameters so that the grid sees the power plant as an equivalent generator whose low-frequency characteristics do not vary with the number of converters in operation. The developments were validated in a laboratory consisting of four 15 kVA converters operating as VSMs, and a grid emulator. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Almost all applications stop scaling at some point; those that don't are seldom performant when considering time to solution on anything but aspirational/unicorn resources. Recognizing these tradeoffs as well as greater user functionality in a near-term exascale computing era, we present libEnsemble, a library aimed at particular scalability- and capability-stretching uses. libEnsemble enables running concurrent instances of an application in dynamically allocated ensembles through an extensible Python library. We highlight the structure, execution, and capabilities of the library on leading pre-exascale environments as well as advanced capabilities for exascale environments and beyond. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the electricity sector the carbon tax is a common environmental policy aiming to reduce CO2 emissions, but is often regarded as economically unfriendly, especially for areas relying on coal-fire and other carbon-intensive generators. A power grid utilizing an energy storage system can be a promising solution to alleviate the regional economy pressure in a grid where the carbon tax is enforced. With the increasing exploitation of clean energy, e.g., solar and wind power, in this work, we characterize the stochastic emission-aware economic dispatch with a storage system utilizing two frameworks, namely a chance-constrained framework and a robust optimization framework. We highlight their differences and connections by studying the trade-offs between robustness and overall cost. Specifically, we bridge the two frameworks with a novel distributed robust optimization framework that considers practical bounds to estimate the optimal system performance under the reliability requirement. Numerical studies on the six-bus model and the IEEE-118 bus model further justify our findings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Capital cost is a practical limitation in distributed energy resources (DER) system sizing and the optimal size may lead to high capital investment. This calls for the development of a framework that provides alternate system sizing with the ability to address capital cost constraints. A framework for sizing microgrid DER considering capital cost constraints and inclusion of manufacturer catalog ratings is introduced in this article. This framework uses a system-wide, composite, cost metric that combines capital costs and operating costs per month. This per-month optimization results are transformed to evaluate the feasible DER ratings and annual savings possible with imposed capital and operating cost constraints. The formulated framework is demonstrated using two microgrid case studies in peak shaving applications at industrial facilities located in the U.K. and USA. This article also introduces development of hardware-in-loop (HIL) system as a tool to validate microgrid sizing results demonstrating that real-time operation can provide the savings projected by the optimized assets. The HIL simulation, with a microgrid controller and the plant sized per the optimization verifies the annual savings. This HIL confirmed that the sizing did not result in violations of state of charge limits of battery energy storage. Traditional optimal sizing approaches do not verify for violations and can result in suboptimal or oversized designs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This letter develops a mathematical model to distribute the under-frequency load shedding amount across the power system load points. The objective is to preserve the system operating point at post-contingency and after the load shedding as close as possible to that of pre-contingency. To do so, the total absolute change in line flows is sought to be minimized. Hence, the system security constraints satisfied before contingency occurrence are less vulnerable to violation. It is proven that when the number of credible contingencies exceeds load shedding candidates, an even distribution across the load points is optimal. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this brief, lossless broadband matching problem with complex generator and load impedances is solved via insertion loss method that is used to design filters with purely resistive generator and load impedances. In the proposed approach, firstly the power delivered to load impedance before inserting the matching network is calculated. Then the desired power delivered to the load impedance after inserting the matching network is defined. Based on these power values, desired power loss ratio is calculated. Then power loss ratio is calculated in terms of input reflection coefficient, which is written by means of generator impedance and input impedance of the matching network when the load impedance is connected to output port. Finally initialized free parameters are optimized until the power loss ratio of the matching network is equal to the desired power loss ratio. Proposed approach can be used to solve broadband double and single matching problems. Two broadband double matching problems are solved to shown how to use the proposed approach. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

With the large-scale integration of renewable power generation, frequency regulation resources (FRRs) are required to have larger capacities and faster ramp rates, which increases the cost of the frequency regulation ancillary service. Therefore, it is necessary to consider the frequency regulation cost and constraint along with real-time economic dispatch (RTED). In this article, a data-driven distributionally robust optimization (DRO) method for RTED considering automatic generation control (AGC) is proposed. First, a Copula-based AGC signal model is developed to reflect the correlations among the AGC signal, load power and renewable generation variations. Secondly, samples of the AGC signal are taken from its conditional probability distribution under the forecasted load power and renewable generation variations. Thirdly, a distributionally robust RTED model considering the frequency regulation cost and constraint is built and transformed into a linear programming problem by leveraging the Wasserstein metric-based DRO technique. Simulation results show that the proposed method can reduce the total cost of power generation and frequency regulation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A novel hierarchical Energy Management System (EMS) framework is proposed for the incorporation of Thermostatically Controlled Loads (TCLs) in the provision of ancillary services, namely frequency and voltage control of a microgrid. The TCL population is aggregated as a function of the ambient temperature, voltage and frequency using a neural network-based approach. The proposed EMS comprises primary and secondary control levels. TCLs’ participation in the primary control is selected to be semi-autonomous in order to obtain a fast response with low communication burden. The secondary control is centralized and aims to find the optimal dispatch of regulating resources including TCL clusters in order to minimize frequency and voltage deviations as well as grid operation cost. The secondary control relies on a Trust-Region Power Flow (PF)-based multi-objective optimization. Simulation results demonstrate that the participation of TCLs in the proposed EMS does not compromise customer comfort while short cycling and the number of switching events are minimized. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A style-based architecture (StyleGAN2) yields outstanding results in data-driven unconditional generative image modeling. This work proposes a Domain-guided Noise-optimization-based Inversion (DNI) method to perform facial image manipulation. It works based on an inverse code that includes: 1) a novel domain-guided encoder called Image2latent to project the image to StyleGAN2 latent space, which can reconstruct an input image with high-quality and maintain its semantic meaning well; 2) a noise optimization mechanism in which a set of noise vectors are used to capture the high-frequency details such as image edges, further improving image reconstruction quality; and 3) a mask for seamless image fusion and local style migration. We further propose a novel semantic alignment evaluation pipeline. It evaluates the semantic alignment with an inverse code by using different attribute boundaries. Extensive qualitative and quantitative comparisons show that DNI can capture rich semantic information and achieve a satisfactory image reconstruction. It can realize a variety of facial image manipulation tasks and outperform state of the art. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The task of image generation started receiving some attention from artists and designers, providing inspiration for new creations. However, exploiting the results of deep generative models such as Generative Adversarial Networks can be long and tedious given the lack of existing tools. In this work, we propose a simple strategy to inspire creators with new generations learned from a dataset of their choice, while providing some control over the output. We design a simple optimization method to find the optimal latent parameters corresponding to the closest generation to any input inspirational image. Specifically, we allow the generation given an inspirational image of the user’s choosing by performing several optimization steps to recover optimal parameters from the model’s latent space. We tested several exploration methods from classical gradient descents to gradient-free optimizers. Many gradient-free optimizers just need comparisons (better/worse than another image), so they can even be used without numerical criterion nor inspirational image, only with human preferences. Thus, by iterating on one’s preferences we can make robust facial composite or fashion generation algorithms. Our results on four datasets of faces, fashion images, and textures show that satisfactory images are effectively retrieved in most cases. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]