Nonconvex Economic Power Dispatch Problem with Multiple Constraints for Thermal Units by an Improved Genetic Algorithm

In this paper, a more realistic formulation of the Economic Dispatch problem is proposed, which considers practical constraints and non linear characteristics. The proposed ED formulation includes ramp rate limits, valve loading effects, equality and inequality constraints, which usually are found simultaneously in realistic power systems. This paper presents a novel Genetic Algorithm to solve the economic load dispatch (ELD) problem of thermal generators of a power system. This method provides an almost global optimal solution and compared with Genetic algorithm, Particle Swarm Optimization and Lambda iteration method since they don’t get stuck at local optimum. The proposed method and its variants are validated for the two test systems consisting of 3 and 10 thermal units whose incremental fuel cost functions takes into account the valve-point loading effects.