Abstract
This paper is concerned with the minimum-cost flow problem over an arbitrary flow network. In this problem, each node is associated with some possibly unknown injection and each line has two unknown flows at its ends that are related to each other via a nonlinear function. Moreover, all injections and flows must satisfy certain box constraints. This problem, named generalized network flow (GNF), is highly non-convex due to its nonlinear equality constraints. Under the assumption of monotonicity and convexity of the flow and cost functions, a convex relaxation is proposed, which is shown to always obtain globally optimal injections. This relaxation may fail to find optimal flows because the mapping from injections to flows is not unique in general. We show that the proposed relaxation, named convexified GNF (CGNF), obtains a globally optimal flow vector if the optimal injection vector is a Pareto point. More generally, the network can be decomposed into two subgraphs such that the lines between the subgraphs are congested at optimality and that CGNF finds correct optimal flows over all lines of one of these subgraphs. We also fully characterize the set of all globally optimal flow vectors, based on the optimal injection vector found via CGNF. In particular, we show that this solution set is a subset of the boundary of a convex set, and may include an exponential number of disconnected components. A primary application of this work is in optimization over electrical power networks.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Goldberg, A.V., Tardos, E., Tarjan, R.E.: Network flow algorithms. In: Korte, B., Lovasz, L., Promel, H.J., Schrijver, A. (eds.) Flows, Paths and VLSI, pp. 101–164. Springer, Berlin (1990)
Jewell, W.S.: Optimal flow through networks with gains. Oper. Res. 10, 476–499 (1962)
Ford, L.R., Fulkerson, D.R.: Flows in Networks. Princeton University Press, Princeton (1962)
Klein, M.: A primal method for minimal cost flows with applications to the assignment and transportation problems. Manag. Sci. 14, 205–220 (1967)
Ahuja, R.K., Magnanti, T.L., Orlin, J.B.: Network Flows: Theory, Algorithms, and Applications. Prentice-Hall, Upper Saddle River (1993)
Bertsimas, D., Sim, M.: Robust discrete optimization and network flows. Math. Program. 98, 49–71 (2003)
Bertsimas, D., Stock-Paterson, S.: The traffic flow management rerouting problem in air traffic control: a dynamic network flow approach. Transp. Sci. 34, 239–255 (2000)
Bazaraa, M.S., Jarvis, J.J., Sherali, H.D.: Linear Programming and Network Flows. Wiley, Hoboken, NJ (1990)
Edmonds, J., Karp, R.M.: Theoretical improvements in algorithmic efficiency for network flow problems. J. ACM 19, 248–264 (1972)
Nygard, K.E., Chandler, P.R., Pachter, M.: Dynamic network flow optimization models for air vehicle resource allocation. In: American Control Conference (2001)
Goldfarb, D., Hao, J.: Polynomial-time primal simplex algorithms for the minimum cost network flow problem. Algorithmica 8, 145–160 (1992)
Bienstock, D., Chopra, S., Gunluk, O., Tsai, C.Y.: Minimum cost capacity installation for multicommodity network flows. Math. Program. 81, 177–199 (1998)
Brannlund, H., Bubenko, J.A., Sjelvgren, D., Andersson, N.: Optimal short term operation planning of a large hydrothermal power system based on a nonlinear network flow concept. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 1, 75–81 (1986)
Goffin, J.L., Gondzio, J., Sarkissian, R., Vial, J.P.: Solving nonlinear multicommodity flow problems by the analytic center cutting plane method. Math. Program. 76, 131–154 (1996)
Boyd, S., Vandenberghe, L.: Convex Optimization. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge (2004)
Kraning, M., Chu, E., Lavaei, J., Boyd, S.: Dynamic network energy management via proximal message passing. Found. Trends Optim. 1(2), 1–54 (2013)
Araposthatis, A., Sastry, S., Varaiya, P.: Analysis of power-flow equation. Int. J. Electr. Power Energy Syst. 3, 115–126 (1981)
Hiskens, I.A., Davy, R.J.: Exploring the power flow solution space boundary. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 16(3), 389–395 (2001)
Sojoudi, S., Lavaei, J.: Physics of power networks makes hard optimization problems easy to solve. In: IEEE Power & Energy Society General Meeting (2012)
Carpentier, J.: Contribution to the economic dispatch problem. Bull. Soc. Fr. Electr. 3, 431–447 (1962)
Dommel, H.W., Tinney, W.F.: Optimal power flow solutions. IEEE Trans. Power Appar. Syst. 10, 1866–1876 (1968)
Momoh, J.A., El-Hawary, M.E., Adapa, R.: A review of selected optimal power flow literature to 1993. Part I: nonlinear and quadratic programming approaches. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 14, 96–104 (1999)
Momoh, J.A., El-Hawary, M.E., Adapa, R.: A review of selected optimal power flow literature to 1993. Part II: Newton, linear programming and interior point methods. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 14, 105–111 (1999)
Overbye, T.J., Cheng, X., Sun, Y.: A comparison of the AC and DC power flow models for LMP calculations. In: Proceedings of the 37th Hawaii International Conference on System Sciences (2004)
Baldick, R.: Applied Optimization: Formulation and Algorithms for Engineering Systems. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge (2006)
Pandya, K.S., Joshi, S.K.: A survey of optimal power flow methods. J. Theor. Appl. Inf. Technol. 4, 450–458 (2008)
Jabr, R.A.: Optimal power flow using an extended conic quadratic formulation. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 23(3), 1000–1008 (2008)
Makarov, Y.V., Dong, Z.Y., Hill, D.J.: On convexity of power flow feasibility boundary. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 23, 811–813 (2008)
Lavaei, J., Low, S.H.: Zero duality gap in optimal power flow problem. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 27(1), 92–107 (2012)
Madani, R., Sojoudi, S., Lavaei, J.: Convex relaxation for optimal power flow problem: Mesh networks. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 30(1), 199–211 (2015)
Madani, R., Ashraphijuo, M., Lavaei, J.: Promises of conic relaxation for contingency-constrained optimal power flow problem. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 31(2), 1297–1307 (2016)
Sojoudi, S., Lavaei, J.: Exactness of semidefinite relaxations for nonlinear optimization problems with underlying graph structure. SIAM J. Optim. 24(4), 1746–1778 (2014)
Lesieutre, B., Molzahn, D., Borden, A., DeMarco, C.L.: Examining the limits of the application of semidefinite programming to power flow problems. In: 49th Annual Allerton Conference (2011)
Bose, S., Gayme, D.F., Low, S., Chandy, M.K.: Optimal power flow over tree networks. In: Proceedings of the Forty-Ninth Annual Allerton Conference (2011)
Zhang, B., Tse, D.: Geometry of injection regions of power networks. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 28(2), 788–797 (2013)
Lavaei, J., Zhang, B., Tse, D.: Geometry of power flows in tree networks. In: IEEE Power & Energy Society General Meeting (2012)
Lavaei, J., Tse, D., Zhang, B.: Geometry of power flows and optimization in distribution networks. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 29(2), 572–583 (2014)
Lavaei, J., Low, S.H.: Convexification of optimal power flow problem. In: 48th Annual Allerton Conference (2010)
Lam, A.Y.S., Zhang, B., Dominguez-Garcia, A., Tse, D.: An optimal and distributed method for voltage regulation in power distribution systems. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 30(4), 1714–1726 (2015)
Gayme, D., Topcu, U.: Optimal power flow with large-scale storage integration. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 28(2), 709–717 (2013)
Weng, Y., Li, Q., Negi, R., Ilic, M.: Semidefinite programming for power system state estimation. In: IEEE Power & Energy Society General Meeting (2012)
Madani, R., Lavaei, J., Baldick, R.: Convexification of power flow equations for power systems in presence of noisy measurements (2016). http://ieor.berkeley.edu/~lavaei/SE_J_2016.pdf
Kekatos, V., Giannakis, G.B., Wollenberg, B.: Optimal placement of phasor measurement units via convex relaxation. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 27(3), 1521–1530 (2012)
Molzahn, D.K., Lesieutre, B.C., DeMarco, C.L.: A sufficient condition for power flow insolvability with applications to voltage stability margins. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 28(3), 2592–2601 (2013)
Sojoudi, S., Low, S.H.: Optimal charging of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles in smart grids. In: IEEE Power & Energy Society General Meeting (2011)
Lavaei, J.: Zero duality gap for classical OPF problem convexifies fundamental nonlinear power problems. In: American Control Conference (2011)
Lavaei, J., Sojoudi, S.: Competitive equilibria in electricity markets with nonlinearities. In: American Control Conference (2012)
Hijazi, H., Coffrin, C., Hentenryck, P.V.: Convex quadratic relaxations for mixed-integer nonlinear programs in power systems. Mathematical Programming Computation, pp. 1–47 (2013)
Kocuk, B., Dey, S.S., Sun, X.A.: Strong SOCP relaxations for the optimal power flow problem. Oper. Res. 64(6), 1177–1196 (2016)
Fattahi, S., Ashraphijuo, M., Lavaei, J., Atamturk, A.: Conic relaxations of the unit commitment problem. Energy 134, 1079–1095 (2017)
O’Neill, R.P., Baldick, R., Helman, U., Rothkopf, M.H., Stewart, W.: Dispatchable transmission in rto markets. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 20(1), 171–179 (2005)
Josz, C., Maeght, J., Panciatici, P., Gilbert, J.C.: Application of the moment-SOS approach to global optimization of the OPF problem. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 30(1), 463–470 (2015)
Molzahn, D., Josz, C., Hiskens, I., Panciatici, P.: Solution of optimal power flow problems using moment relaxations augmented with objective function penalization. In: IEEE Conference on Decision and Control (CDC), pp. 31–38 (2015)
Lasserre, J.B.: Global optimization with polynomials and the problem of moments. SIAM J. Optim. 11(3), 796–817 (2001)
Madani, R., Sojoudi, S., Fazelnia, G., Lavaei, J.: Finding low-rank solutions of sparse linear matrix inequalities using convex optimization. SIAM J. Optim. 27(2), 725–758 (2017)
Sojoudi, S., Lavaei, J.: Convexification of optimal power flow problem by means of phase shifters. In: IEEE International Conference on Smart Grid Communications, pp. 756–761 (2013)
Farivar, M., Low, S.H.: Branch flow model: relaxations and convexification—Part II. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 28(3), 2565–2572 (2013)
Low, S.H.: Convex relaxation of optimal power flow—Part I: formulations and equivalence. IEEE Trans. Control Netw. Syst. 1(1), 15–27 (2014)
Low, S.H.: Convex relaxation of optimal power flow—Part II: exactness. IEEE Trans. Control Netw. Syst. 1(2), 177–189 (2014)
Coffrin, C., Gordon, D., Scott, P.: NESTA, the NICTA Energy System Test Case Archive (2014). arXiv:1411.0359
Lehmann, K., Grastien, A., Van Hentenryck, P.: AC-feasibility on tree networks is NP-hard. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 31(1), 798–801 (2016)
Bolognani, S., Zampieri, S.: On the existence and linear approximation of the power flow solution in power distribution networks. IEEE Trans. Power Syst. 31(1), 163–172 (2016)
Dvijotham, K., Nguyen, H., Turitsyn, K.: Solvability regions of affinely parameterized quadratic equations. IEEE Control Syst. Lett. 2(1), 25–30 (2018)
Nguyen, H.D., Dvijotham, K., Turitsyn, K.: Inner approximations of power flow feasibility sets (2017). arXiv:1708.06845
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
This work was supported by DARPA YFA, ONR YIP Award, AFOSR YIP Award, NSF CAREER Award 1351279 and ONR N00014-17-1-2933. Parts of this work have appeared in the conference paper: Convex Analysis of Generalized Flow Networks, 54th IEEE Conference on Decision and Control, 2015.
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Sojoudi, S., Fattahi, S. & Lavaei, J. Convexification of generalized network flow problem. Math. Program. 173, 353–391 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10107-017-1223-7
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10107-017-1223-7
Keywords
- Network flow
- Lossy networks
- Convex optimization
- Convex relaxation
- Electrical power networks
- Optimal power flow