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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 21, NO. 3, JULY 2006

Evaluating Distributed Generation

Impacts With a Multiobjective Index
Luis F. Ochoa, Student Member, IEEE, Antonio Padilha-Feltrin, Member, IEEE, and Gareth P. Harrison, Member, IEEE

AbstractEvaluating the technical impacts associated with

connecting distributed generation to distribution networks is a
complex activity requiring a wide range of network operational
and security effects to be qualified and quantified. One means of
dealing with such complexity is through the use of indices that
indicate the benefit or otherwise of connections at a given location
and which could be used to shape the nature of the contract
between the utility and distributed generator. This paper presents
a multiobjective performance index for distribution networks
with distributed generation which considers a wide range of
technical issues. Distributed generation is extensively located and
sized within the IEEE-34 test feeder, wherein the multiobjective
performance index is computed for each configuration. The results
are presented and discussed.
Index TermsDistributed generation (DG), distribution networks, multiobjective analysis.

I. INTRODUCTION

ISTRIBUTED GENERATION (DG) is expected to play

an increasingly important role in the electric power system
infrastructure and market. Defined as the development of a set
of sources of electric power connected to the distribution network or the customer side of the meter [1], DG technologies include photovoltaic, wind turbines, internal combustion engines,
combustion turbines, and microturbines and fuel cells, among
others. Integration of DG in distribution networks may create
technical and safety problems [2][7]. Depending on its location, DG may increase fault currents, cause voltage oscillations,
interfere with voltage-control processes, diminish or increase
losses, etc.
As distribution networks with DG are no longer passive, all
questions about planning, maintenance, and operation become
more interesting and demand reassessment. The main issues
include where to locate and how to operate DG to minimize
the impact on distribution management. Additionally, it will be
necessary to investigate whether DG capability and placement

Manuscript received February 3, 2005; revised April 29, 2005. This work
was supported by FEPISA (Ilha Solteira-SP, Brazil) and the Programme Alban,
the European Union Programme of High Level Scholarships for Latin America,
under scholarship E04D046001BR. Paper no. TPWRD-00062-2005.
L. F. Ochoa is with the Department of Electrical Engineering, Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP) and with the School of Engineering and
Electronics, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh EH9 3JL, U.K. (e-mail:
luis_ochoa@ieee.org).
A. Padilha-Feltrin is with the Department of Electrical Engineering, Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP), Ilha Solteira CEP 15385000, Brazil (e-mail:
padilha@dee.feis.unesp.br).
G. P. Harrison is with the School of Engineering and Electronics, University
of Edinburgh, Edinburgh EH9 3JL, U.K. (e-mail: gareth.harrison@ed.ac.uk).
Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/TPWRD.2005.860262

could be used to enhance distribution network planning and operation [7][16]. Consequently, it is critical to assess the technical impacts of DG in power systems in order to apply generators in a manner that avoids causing degradation of power
quality and reliability.
In this work, the technical impacts on medium-voltage level
reliability and power quality will be assessed based on a steadystate analysis and the application of distribution network impact
indices. Then, in order to calculate the multiobjective performance index by relating the different technical issues, relevance
(weighting) factors are presented.
Although in practice, distribution engineers will present
some limitations in determining DG location, the existence of
an index based on technical impacts indicates where DG could
be more beneficial for the distribution network (i.e. for the electric utility, helping distribution engineers take decisions and
even shape the nature of the contract that might be established
between the network operator and the distributed generator
owner [15]).
This paper is structured as follows. Section II presents the
distribution network impact indices to be considered in the proposed methodology, Section III lays out the multiobjective performance index, in Section IV, the IEEE-34 test network is described. Finally, in Section V, results obtained with the multiobjective performance index are analyzed and discussed.
II. DISTRIBUTION NETWORK IMPACT INDICES
There are various technical issues that need to be addressed
when considering the presence of generators in distribution networks. Reference [17] presented an approach aimed at quantifying the benefits of DG such as voltage profile, line-loss reduction, and environmental impact reduction. However, that proposal disregards technical issues that could measure the negative impacts of DG, thus showing that some potentially beneficial connection points present various drawbacks. In this work,
several indices will be computed in order to describe the impacts on the network due to the presence of distributed generation during maximum power generation. Maximum network demand will be used in all indices, including that related to voltage
regulation which will also use minimum demand to fully capture
the voltage variation between both load scenarios. Since distribution networks are inherently unbalanced due to load characteristics and topology, here the indices will, explicitly, consider
. This approach is
phases , , and , and the neutral wire
also applicable to balanced systems.
For the th distribution network configuration considering
DG, the indices considered are the following.

0885-8977/$20.00 2006 IEEE

OCHOA et al.: EVALUATING DISTRIBUTED GENERATION IMPACTS WITH A MULTIOBJECTIVE INDEX

A. Real and Reactive Power Losses

Although reliability is the primary concern for utilities, network losses are a key consideration particularly given the twin
drivers for efficiency given environmental and economic concerns. While DG may unload lines and reduce losses, the reverse power flows from larger DG can give rise to excessive
and
)
losses. Consequently, the first and second indices (
express real and reactive line power losses, respectively. Thus,
a beneficial DG location would decrease total network losses,
and
which means near unity values of
(1)
(2)
where
is the total complex power losses for the th disis the total comtribution network configuration, and
plex power losses for the distribution network without DG.
B. Voltage
One advantage of careful location and sizing of DG is the
enhancement of the voltage profile. Therefore, the third index
is related to the maximum voltage drop which, in this
three-phase approach, will consider the maximum drop between
each phase of each node and the root node. This index could be
also used to find prohibitive locations for DG considering preestablished voltage drop limits. In this way, according to (3), the
is, the better the network performance
closer to unity index
(3)
where are the phases , , and ;
are the voltages at the
are the
root node (equal in magnitude for the three phases);
voltages at node for the th distribution network configuration;
and
is the number of nodes.
This maximum voltage drop approach is suitable for
single-feeder analysis. In multiple-feeder systems, DG relieves
the load demand and modifies the voltage profile in the feeder(s)
must first consider the
in which it is located. Therefore,
maximum improvement of the voltage drop in the feeder(s)
with DG and then normalize those values with respect to the
. In this way, a DG configuration that presents
largest
the largest improvement will receive an
equal to unity
whereas the others will have proportional values (Appendix A).
In order to ensure that network voltages will not be adversely
affected, the case of minimum demand during maximum power
generation is also considered, since it represents a critical operating case [16]. Thus, the fourth index, related to voltage regulation, shows the difference between nodal voltages during maximum and minimum demand. It is desirable to have this variation as small as possible (i.e., close to unity values for index
)

(4)

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are voltages at node for the th distribution

where
network configuration considering minimum demand.
C. Current Capacity of Conductors
As a consequence of supplying power near to loads, current
flows may diminish in some sections of the network, thus releasing more capacity, but they could also increase to levels begives imporyond distribution line limits. The fifth index
tant information about the level of currents through the network
regarding the maximum capacity of conductors. Since reconductoring is out of the scope of this work, only configurations
positive values (calculated currents values greater than
with
current capacity) will be analyzed. Within those configurations,
close to unity values for this index mean reserve capacity for
demand growth
(5)
where
and
are the currents through branch
for
and
the th distribution network configuration,
are the current capacity of conductors, and
is the number of
lines.
D. Three-Phase and Single-Phase-to-Ground Short Circuit
and
) are related to
The sixth and seventh indices (
the protection and selectivity issues since they evaluate the maximum short-circuit current variation between the scenarios with
and without DG. These indices give the power engineer a notion of how the DG impacts on the protection devices that were
planned for a network without such generation units. Hence,
a low impact on this concern means close-to-unity values for
and
indices
(6)

(7)
where
is the three-phase fault current value in node
for the th distribution network configuration,
is the
three-phase fault current value in node for the distribution netand
are the largest threework without DG,
phase fault current value in the network for the th distribution
network configuration and its correspondent for the distribution
is the single-phase fault current
network without DG,
value in node for the th distribution network configuration,
is the single-phase fault current value in node for the
and
are the largest
distribution network without DG,
single-phase fault current value in the network for the th distribution network configuration and its correspondent for the distribution network without DG.
The indices described above are signals of the network performance, where values that are close to unity indicate better
network performance. However, these indices are not related in
such a way that would allow a unique index to indicate the extent
of the DG impact, in a global manner, on a distribution network.

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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 21, NO. 3, JULY 2006

TABLE I
RELEVANCE FACTORS

III. MULTIOBJECTIVE INDEX

The multiobjective index for the performance calculation of
networks with DG considers all previously mentioned indices
by strategically giving a relevance (weighting) factor to each
one. This can be performed since all impact indices were normalized (i.e., present nondimensional values from zero to one).
is given by
The multiobjective performance index

(8)
where

These relevance factors are intended to give the corresponding importance to each technical issue (impact indices)
due to the presence of DG and depend on the required analysis
(e.g., planning, regular operation, emergency operation).
In general, it is difficult to determine suitable values for the
relevance factors. Therefore, the experience of distribution engineers should be harnessed in order to obtain adequate values.
Furthermore, the relevance factors should be flexible since electric utilities present different concerns about losses, voltages,
protection schemes, etc. This flexibility makes the proposed
methodology even more suitable as a tool for finding the most
beneficial places where DGs may be inserted, regarding the
electric utilities technical perspective and, consequently, regarding the DG owners economic perspective since utilities
may incentivize (or even disincentivize) connections points that
are more beneficial based on the technical impacts.
Table I shows the values for the relevance factors utilized in
this work, considering a normal operation stage analysis. Those
values may vary according to the network operators concerns.
For the analysis in this paper, the active power losses received
a significant relevance factor (0.33) since it can be important in
many applications of DG. The behavior of the voltage profile
and
), as a consequence of total loss reduction, also
(
receives a major weighting (0.25) due to its considerable powerand
quality impacts. Protection and selectivity impacts (
) received weightings of 0.22 since they evaluate important
reliability problems that DG presents in distribution networks.
The multiobjective index will numerically describe the impact of DG, considering a given location and size, on a distribution network. Close to unity values for the multiobjective performance index means higher DG benefits.

Fig. 1. IEEE-34 test feeder.

are concentrated 56 km away from the root node (the most distant node is 59 km from the substation). X/R ranges from 0.91
is 24.9 kV. This feeder
to 2.25. Line-to-line base voltage
presents ACSR 1/0, two and four conductors.
The network is simplified by replacing the 24.9-kV/4.16-kV
inline transformer in the original IEEE-34 test feeder with a line
and modeling the entire feeder at a single voltage level. The
automatic voltage regulator is also not represented.
V. APPLICATIONS
The three-phase four-wire power-flow algorithm, based on
the current summation backwardforward technique, described
in [20], was adopted. Loads were modeled as constant power
and represent the maximum demand. Here, total losses consider
only line losses based on a three-phase four-wire approach. It
is important to recall the role of the neutral wire in the total
line losses computation [18]. Nevertheless, total losses should
be computed according to the procedures adopted by the utility
(e.g., three-phase three-wire approach, considering transformer
losses, etc.).
The impact indices presented in Section II were calculated
by extensively locating and sizing DG in the above described
distribution network in order to illustrate how these indices vary
regarding the insertion point and capability of a generation unit.
Figs. 2 and 3 show the impact indices for the IEEE-34 test
feeder considering two different generation power outputs: 300
and 1200 kW, respectively (operating at unity power factor).
Those values represent 16.9% and 67.8% of the network total
demand, respectively. Each figure was obtained by computing
the impact indices considering a generator located in each feasible node (three-phase node).
Short-circuit analysis was performed based on symmetrical
components. The system zero- and positive-sequence impedances at the high-voltage (HV)/MV substation are
and
, respectively; the generators zero-, positive-, and negative-sequence impedances are
,
, and
, respectively. The minimum demand level considered was 10% of the maximum and was used for calculating the
index.

IV. TEST NETWORK

The IEEE 34-bus three-phase medium-voltage radial feeder
[19] will be used in order to perform the proposed analysis
(Fig. 1). Its total demand is 1770 kW, and 72% of the loads

A. Impact Indices and IMO with DG Location and Size

From Fig. 2(a) and Fig. 3(a), it can be observed that indices
,
,
,
, and , related to the power losses, voltage

OCHOA et al.: EVALUATING DISTRIBUTED GENERATION IMPACTS WITH A MULTIOBJECTIVE INDEX

Fig. 2. Impact indices for IEEE-34 test feeder with a 300-kW generator sited
at each node of the circuit. (a) Indices ILp, ILq, IVD, IVR, and IC. (b) Indices
ISC3 and ISC1.

drop and regulation, and conductors capacities, achieve higher

values when DG is sited near the load concentration (i.e., far
from the substation). This indicates the importance of locating
and
DG near the load. It can be noted that the values for
present similar results; however, these indices should be
analyzed separately particularly where DG is operating away
from the unity power factor.
It is also clear that both real and reactive total losses decrease
and
achieved higher
with the power generation output (
values with 1200 kW of power generation). Consequently, the
also achieved higher
index related with voltage drop
values with higher power generation output. Moreover, since
voltage drops were smaller with a higher power generation
output, differences between maximum and minimum demand
voltages were also smaller. Thus, the index related to voltage
achieved greater values.
regulation
The tendency of the maximum usage of the current capacity
of conductors index
is to increase when the DG unit is close
to the load concentration (in this case, far from the substation)
(i.e., power flow from the substation diminished, alleviating the
capacity of conductors).
and
As explained in Section II, short-circuit indices (
), presented in Figs. 2(b) and 3(b), considered the maximum values of the ratios between short circuit with DG and
without DG (original network), with faults in all nodes. The
maximum values for those ratios, for the analyzed generator, appeared when a fault occurred at the generation node. Therefore,

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Fig. 3. Impact indices for the IEEE-34 test feeder with a 1200-kW generator
sited at each node of the circuit. (a) Indices ILp, ILq, IVD, IVR, and IC. (b)
Indices ISC3 and ISC1.

TABLE II
IMPACT INDICES COMPARISON FOR IEEE-34 TEST FEEDER CONSIDERING
DIFFERENT POWER GENERATION OUTPUT (POWER FACTOR 1.0)

the greater the distance between the substation and the DG is,
the lower the
and
values are. Also, it is important to
and
present similar tendencies
remark that indices
because of the normalization. However, the ratios fault with
DG/fault without DG are different as indicated in Table II.
Summarizing the assessment of the impact indices shows that
each index is capable of indicating how a DG unit benefits or
harms the distribution network. Nevertheless, while these indices remain as isolated values, it is difficult to use them as a decision-making tool. Therefore, the multiobjective performance
becomes essential for assessing technical impacts
index

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Fig. 4. Multiobjective performance index for the IEEE-34 test feeder with
different power generation outputs extensively located in the circuit.

in a global manner regarding specific concerns of an electric

utility.
Based on the adopted relevance factors (Table I), Fig. 4 shows
values obtained by using the impact indices previthe
ously calculated in Figs. 2 and 3, and also considering a case
with 600-kW power generation output. It is noticeable that for
300-kW power generation, most nodes present almost the same
values, whereas for 1200 kW, a certain set of nodes (neighvalues (more beneborhood of node 19) have the largest
fits to the distribution network). Fig. 4 also shows that the
values increase with the power generation output, mainly due to
the impact on the total power losses.
To show how DG insertion can impact on distribution networks, Table II presents the non-normalized impact indices for
power generation outputs from Fig. 4, calculated for a DG unit
for the three power generation
located at node 19 (largest
output cases). The benefits of DG connection are represented
,
,
,
, and , where losses diminished up to
by
38%, 64%, and 91%, for 300, 600, and 1200 kW of output, respectively. Even considering the first case of power generation
output (300 kW, feeding 16.9% of the network demand), expressive benefits are achieved when a DG unit is suitably inserted
in the feeder: voltage drop and maximum usage of the current
capacity of conductors decreased up to 20% compared to the
original network (no DG). However, by locating a DG unit at
node 19, the maximum three-phase and single-phase short-circuit currents are, respectively, nine and 19 times the original
and
short-circuit currents (no DG). The values of
mean that special attention should be paid to the adjustment and
selection of protection devices.
B. IMO and Total Line Power Losses
Since most attention is given to the impact on network total
losses, Fig. 5 shows
and total active power-loss curves for
a DG unit located at node 19 with variable power generation
output. Dashed squares show the corresponding values for the
three cases analyzed above (300, 600, and 1200 kW). It should
values are closely related to the power
be noted that the
value) due
losses (the smaller the losses, the larger the
. Fig. 5
to the high relevance factor assigned to the index
also indicates that increasing power generation output to values
near the network total demand tends to increase the total losses.

IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 21, NO. 3, JULY 2006

Fig. 5. Multiobjective performance index and total power losses for IEEE-34
test feeder varying the power generation output at node 19.

Fig. 6. Multiobjective performance index for IEEE-34 test feeder considering

different power factors (power generation 600 kW).

Beyond reaching that point,

values decrease. Furthermore,
the smallest total losses were achieved with 1650 kW of power
value.
generation, which also exhibits the maximum
C. Impact Indices and IMO with different Power Factor
In the same way that technical impacts vary according to
the power generation, they also vary according to the operating
curves considpower factor of generators. Fig. 6 shows the
ering 600 kW of power generation and three different operating
power factors: 0.95 lagging (producing reactive power), unity,
and 0.95 leading (absorbing reactive power). Table III shows the
non-normalized impact indices for a DG unit located at the most
beneficial nodes found for each case.
It is evident that the proposed impact indices are sensitive to
the reactive power produced or absorbed by distributed generation, as can be observed in Table III. Moreover, results suggest
that with 600 kW of power generation, a 0.95 lagging power
factor presents more benefits (Fig. 6 and Table III) (i.e., producing reactive power improves network performance).
Since three-phase load data are difficult to obtain, a singlephase analysis is required. Therefore, after adapting the presented impact indices, the analysis described above (varying
generation at unity power factor and varying power factor with
600-kW power generation) was carried out considering a singlecurves presented the same tendencies,
phase approach.

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TABLE III
IMPACT INDICES COMPARISON FOR IEEE-34 TEST FEEDER CONSIDERING
DIFFERENT POWER FACTORS (POWER GENERATION 600 kW)

Fig. 7.

and almost the same values than the three-phase analysis. Nevertheless, high unbalanced loads could make noticeable differvalues using single-phase and three-phase
ences between
approaches.
In general, distribution networks will not present the same
impact indices tendencies, regarding power generation output
and operating power factor. It is not necessarily surprising that
a higher power generation output does not bring more benefits
since it will depend mainly on the load distribution and location
of the DG.
The proposed methodology does not consider the time variation of loading levels and their associated DG benefits or otherwise. Extension of the approach with time-varying loading
and power generation patterns could evaluate the time-dependent benefits or drawbacks of DG. Other constraints or impact
indices, reflecting economic [12]; environmental [17]; or reliability [2], [7] considerations may be included depending on the
availability of required data as well as the analysis of reverse
power flows.
VI. CONCLUSION
Various impact indices were addressed in this work, aimed at
characterizing the benefits and negative impacts of DG in distribution networks. Furthermore, a multiobjective performance
index that relates impact indices by strategically assigning a relevance factor to each index was proposed.
Though the selection of values of relevance factors will
depend on engineering experience, the presented values solved,
in a satisfactory and coherent fashion, the DG location problem,
considering different power generation outputs for the IEEE-34
test feeder. Nevertheless, the proposed relevance factors are
flexible since electric utilities have different concerns about
losses, voltages, protection schemes, etc. This flexibility makes
the proposed methodology even more suitable as a tool for
finding the most beneficial places where DGs may be located,
as viewed from an electric utility technical perspective. Consequently, these may have an economic influence, since technical
impacts may be used to shape the nature of the contract that
might be established between the utility and the DG owner [15].

Nine-bus radial system [17].

Fig. 8. Multiobjective performance index (IMO), active power losses index

(ILp), and voltage drop index (IVD) for nine-bus systems for three power
generation output scenarios (0.05, 0.10, and 0.15 p.u.).

APPENDIX
An analysis of a nine-bus radial distribution test system
(Fig. 7), presented in [17], is performed in this section, as well
as a comparison between results obtained in that reference and
those with the proposed methodology. The following assumptions were considered: 135-kV three-phase three-wire balanced
;
system; line section impedance is
system zero- and positive-sequence impedances at the HV/MV
and
,
substation are
respectively; the generators zero, positive-, and neg,
ative-sequence impedances are
, and
, respectively. Minimum demand level considered is 10% of the
maximum. Loads were modeled as constant power.
Eight configurations were analyzed by locating a DG unit in
nodes 2 to 9 considering three power generation scenarios: 18,
36, and 54 MW (0.05, 0.10, and 0.15 p.u., respectively, on a
400-MVA base) with a power factor 0.9 lagging, whereas the
total network demand is 311.352 MW.
values and impact indices
Figs. 8 and 9 show calculated
,
and
for the three power generation scenarios.
values
It can be noticed that according to the obtained
(using relevance factors from Table I), node 7 presents most
benefits for the three power generation scenarios. This is mainly
due to its high influence in reducing losses and improving the
voltage profile in its corresponding feeder. At the same time,
node 7 presents a reduced number of line sections with reverse
power flow (solely for 54-MW generation) and better short-circuit index values than nodes 8 and 9 which are farther from the
substation (Fig. 9).
Since this network presents three feeders, the calculation of
was normalized considering the best voltage profile improvement found. In this way, a DG unit located at node 9 preequal to unity, 0.011 p.u.
sented the largest improvement (

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IEEE TRANSACTIONS ON POWER DELIVERY, VOL. 21, NO. 3, JULY 2006

Fig. 9. Line-to-ground short-circuit index (ISC1) for nine-bus systems for

three power generation output scenarios (0.05, 0.10, and 0.15 p.u.).

over the configuration without DG) with 0.05 p.u. of power generation, whereas for 0.10 and 0.15 p.u. (0.023 and 0.013 p.u.,
respectively) it was for the connection at node 7. It can be obvalues
served that when locating DG at nodes 8 and 9,
are the smallest, thus discouraging such locations (Fig. 9) when
values are calculated.
values, it can
Comparing nodes 8 and 9 according to the
be concluded that for power generation of 0.05 and 0.10 p.u., the
connection at node 8 is more beneficial, whereas for 0.15 p.u., it
is at node 9. However, only the latter power generation scenario
result agrees with the analysis performed in [17] (Table A-4,
Cases 1 and 2, Set #1) where it was found that the connection
at node 9 is better than node 8 for the same three scenarios.
This occurs because the proposed methodology utilizes other
,
and
, that affect the
impact indices, such as
index. Consequently, it can be concluded that these
global
impact indices should be taken into account in order to consider
the drawbacks of each analyzed configuration.

[10] E. Van Geert, Toward new challenges for distribution system planners,
in Proc. Int. Conf. Exhibit. Electricity Distribution. Part 1. Contributions, vol. 6, 1997, pp. I1/1I1/3.
[11] A. Silvestri, A. Berizzi, and S. Buonanno, Distributed generation planning using genetic algorithms, in Proc. IEEE PowerTech, 1999, p. 257.
[12] G. Celli and F. Pilo, MV network planning under uncertainties on distributed generation penetration, in Proc. IEEE Power Eng. Soc. Summer
Meeting, vol. 1, 2001, pp. 485490.
[13] R. E. Brown, J. Pan, X. Feng, and K. Koutlev, Siting distributed generation to defer T&D expansion, Proc. IEEE Power Engineering Soc.
Transmission Distribution Conf. Expo., vol. 2, pp. 622627, 2001.
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within distribution networks in restructured electricity markets, IEEE
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[15] R. C. Dugan, T. E. McDermott, and G. J. Ball, Planning for distributed
generation, IEEE Ind. Appl. Mag., vol. 7, no. 2, pp. 8088, Mar./Apr.
2001.
[16] C. L. Masters, Voltage risethe big issue when connecting embedded
generation to long 11 kV overhead lines, Power Eng. J., vol. 16, no. 1,
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[18] W. H. Kersting, The computation of neutral and dirt currents and power
losses, in Proc. IEEE Power Eng. Soc. Transmission Distribution Conf.
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[19] W. H. Kersting, Radial distribution test feeders, IEEE Trans. Power
Syst., vol. 6, no. 3, pp. 975985, Aug. 1991.
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Luis F. Ochoa (S01) received the M.Sc. degree

in 2003 from the Universidade Estadual Paulista
(UNESP), Ilha Solteira, Brazil, where he is currently
pursuing the Ph.D. degree.
Currently, he is a Visiting Postgraduate Researcher
with the School of Engineering and Electronics,
University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, U.K. His
research interests are distribution system analysis
and distributed generation.

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5, pp. 527535, Sep. 2003.

Antonio Padilha-Feltrin (M89) received the B.Sc.

degree from the Escola Federal de Engenharia de Itajub (EFEI), Itajub, Brazil, and the M.Sc. and Ph.D.
degrees from the Universidade Estadual de Campinas
(UNICAMP), Campinas, Brazil.
Currently, he is an Associate Professor with
the Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP), Ilha
Solteira, Brazil. From 1995 to 1997, he was a
Visiting Faculty Member with the Electrical and
Computer Engineering (ECE) Department, University of Wisconsin-Madison. His main interests are
analysis and control of power systems.

Gareth P. Harrison (M02) is a Lecturer in Energy

Systems with the School of Engineering and Electronics, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh, U.K.
His research interests include network integration of
distributed generation and analysis of the impact of
climate change in the electricity industry.
Dr. Harrison is a Chartered Engineer and member
of the Institution of Electrical Engineers, U.K.