Optimal Thermal Generating Unit Commitment via Evolutionary Algorithms: A Review

Nitin Tyagi; Tushar Tyagi

Abstract

This paper presents a literature survey of economic load dispatch problem. The economic load dispatch (ELD) is one of the most important optimization problems of electrical power system. The aim of the ELD problem is to determine the power productions of total generating units from a system in order to have minimum fuel cost, and to meet the all constrains. Solving ELD involves conveying a precise model of optimization and then selecting an appropriate optimization technique. The simplest model for the ELD problem is one in which the fuel cost of the generating units is quadratic in nature, and with two constraints only: the equality and inequality constraints, respectively; the generators operate between the minimum and maximum limits of power. However, the more practical features of the operational units, the precise model is improved by considering the valve-point effects and by presenting the constraints like ramp rate limits, prohibited zones, the transmission losses; it introduces a non-linear, non-smooth and non-continuous accurate model of optimization. To solve the ELD problem, several methods, classic or based on artificial intelligence, have been used over time. Several soft computing methods like particle swarm optimization (PSO), artificial bee colony (ABC), ant colony optimization (ACO), simulated annealing (SA), genetic algorithm (GA), etc. are now being applied to find even better solution to the ELD problem. An interesting trend in this area is application of hybrid approaches like GA-PSO, ABC-PSO, CSA-SA, etc. and the results are found to be highly competitive.Cite this ArticleNitin Tyagi, Tushar Tyagi. Optimal Thermal Generating Unit Commitment via Evolutionary Algorithms: A Review. Journal of Artificial Intelligence Research & Advances. 2016; 3(2): 26–32p.

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