International Journal of
Information and Education Technology

Abstract

This paper presents an efficient and reliable biogeography–based optimization (BBO) algorithm to solve both convex and nonconvex Economic load dispatch problem (ELD) with Ramp rate limit of thermal power plants. Economic load dispatch (ELD) is a method to schedule the power generator outputs with respect to the load demands, and to operate the power system most economically. The objective of ELD is that the sharing of power demand among the online generators keeping minimum cost of generation as a constraint. This paper mainly focuses on minimizing the total fuel cost of all generators of the power system. BBO is a biology inspired optimization technique developed by Dan Simon in 2008 and is inspired by mathematical models of biogeography by Robert MacArthur and Edward Wilson. BBO is based on the science of biogeography. This paper presents an application of the BBO algorithm to economic load dispatch problem with ramp rate limit for 13 & 18 generator test case system. Economic load dispatch problems are applied and compared its solution quality and computation efficiency to Genetic algorithm (GA) and other optimization techniques. The simulation results show that the proposed algorithm outperforms previous optimization methods.