  As rooftop solar PVs installed by residential customers penetrate in low
voltage distribution network (LVDN), some issues, e.g. over/under voltage and
unbalances, which may undermine the network's operational performance, need to
be effectively addressed. To mitigate unbalances in LVDN, dynamic switching
devices (PSDs) and static var compensator (SVC) are two equipment that are
cost-effective and efficient. However, most existing research on operating PSDs
are based on inflexible heuristic algorithms or without considering the network
formulation, which may lead to strategies that violate operational
requirements. Moreover, few pieces of literature have been reported on
mitigating unbalances in LVDN via SVC and PSDs together. This paper, after
presenting the dispatch model of SVC, formulates the decision-making process as
a mixed-integer non-convex programming (MINCP) problem considering all
practical operational requirements. To efficiently solve the challenging
problem, the MINCP is reformulated as a mixed-integer second order-cone
programming (MISOCP) problem based on either exact reformulations or accurate
approximations, making it possible to employ efficient off-the-shelf solvers.
Simulations based on a modified IEEE system and a practical system in Australia
demonstrates the efficiency of the proposed method in mitigating unbalances in
LVDN.
