In recent years

fault indicator is used widely for fault location of distribution network thanks to its access flexibility and economy. However

excessive installation is unnecessary and reasonable selection and installation of the number and positions of the fault indicator can reach the comprehensive optimization of both reliability and economy of the distribution network. For optimal configuration problem of fault indicator in distribution network

a kind of objective function with compressive consideration of reliability index and economy of the distribution network is proposed in this paper

and the optimization solution is performed by the use of binary particle swarm optimization algorithm. The effectiveness of the proposed model is verified by testing in the IEEE 33 node distribution system and is compared with the optimization result of immune algorithm. It is shown by the analysis result that the binary particle swarm optimization algorithm has advantage for solving the problem because of its fast convergence speed and less iteration times.