Optimal economic dispatch of power generation solution using lightning search algorithm

Abstract

Economic dispatch (ED) is the power demand allocating process for the committed units at minimum generation cost while satisfying system and operational constraints. Increasing cost of fuel price and electricity demand can increase the cost of thermal power generation. Therefore, robust and efficient optimization algorithm is required to determine the optimal solution for ED problem in power system operation and planning. In this paper the lightning search algorithm (LSA) is proposed to solve the ED problem. The system constraints such as power balance, generator limits, system transmission losses and valve-points effects (VPE) are considered in this paper. To verify the effectiveness of LSA in terms of convergence characteristic, robustness, simulation time and solution quality, the two case studies consists of 6 and 13 units have been tested. The simulation results show that the LSA can provide optimal cost than many methods reported in literature. Therefore, it has potential to solve many optimization problems in power dispatch and power system applications.