Accelerated DC loadflow solver for topology optimization

We present a massively parallel solver that accelerates DC loadflow computations for power grid topology optimization tasks. Our approach leverages low-rank updates of the Power Transfer Distribution Factors (PTDFs) to represent substation splits, line outages, and reconfigurations without ever refactorizing the system. Furthermore, we implement the core routines on Graphics Processing Units (GPUs), thereby exploiting their high-throughput architecture for linear algebra. A two-level decomposition separates changes in branch topology from changes in nodal injections, enabling additional speed-ups by an in-the-loop brute force search over injection variations at minimal additional cost. We demonstrate billion-loadflow-per-second performance on power grids of varying sizes in workload settings which are typical for gradient-free topology optimization such as Reinforcement Learning or Quality Diversity methods. While adopting the DC approximation sacrifices some accuracy and prohibits the computation of voltage magnitudes, we show that this sacrifice unlocks new scales of computational feasibility, offering a powerful tool for large-scale grid planning and operational topology optimization.

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Publication Details

Published
2025-06-29
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1109/powertech59965.2025.11180422
Primary Topic
Electric Power System Optimization
Type
article
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article

Accelerated DC loadflow solver for topology optimization

Christopher J. Merz, Jouke van Dijk, Dirk Witthaut, Jan Viebahn et al.
Electric Power System Optimization
article

Accelerated DC loadflow solver for topology optimization

Christopher J. Merz, Jouke van Dijk, Dirk Witthaut, Jan Viebahn, Nico Westerbeck
article en

Abstract

We present a massively parallel solver that accelerates DC loadflow computations for power grid topology optimization tasks. Our approach leverages low-rank updates of the Power Transfer Distribution Factors (PTDFs) to represent substation splits, line outages, and reconfigurations without ever refactorizing the system. Furthermore, we implement the core routines on Graphics Processing Units (GPUs), thereby exploiting their high-throughput architecture for linear algebra. A two-level decomposition separates changes in branch topology from changes in nodal injections, enabling additional speed-ups by an in-the-loop brute force search over injection variations at minimal additional cost. We demonstrate billion-loadflow-per-second performance on power grids of varying sizes in workload settings which are typical for gradient-free topology optimization such as Reinforcement Learning or Quality Diversity methods. While adopting the DC approximation sacrifices some accuracy and prohibits the computation of voltage magnitudes, we show that this sacrifice unlocks new scales of computational feasibility, offering a powerful tool for large-scale grid planning and operational topology optimization.

Forschungszentrum Jülich (DE), Institut für Europäische Politik (DE), Elia (Belgium) (BE), Tennet (Netherlands) (NL)
Openalex Percentile: Top 72%
Electric Power System Optimization
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Accelerated DC loadflow solver for topology optimization — Christopher J. Merz, Jouke van Dijk, et al. · (2025) | TGRS Research Map | TGRS