Non-convex optimization of combined enviromental economic dispatch through the third version of the cultural algorithm (CA3)

Economic load dispatch (ELD) is conventionally defined as the process of allocating generation among the running generating units such that the demand is satisfied and the fuel cost is minimized. Due to increased environmental regulation, emission constraints are being added to redefine the conventional ELD problem. It is important to minimize both the operating fuel cost and emission levels simultaneously while satisfying the load demand; this process is known as combined environmental economic dispatch (CEED). The resultant CEED becomes a challenging non-convex optimization problem, which is difficult to solve using the traditional methods such as lambda iteration and gradient method. To tackle this barrier the study has proposed a novel heuristic search technique based on a modified version of the cultural algorithm (CA3) to solve the CEED problem whilst considering transmission line losses and several physical constraints of generating units. In order to validate the aims of this study, the proposed approach has been applied in two different test systems; 5 generating units and 20 generating units systems. The results of the simulations show that the proposed method of the study provides a lower generation cost for the CEED problem in comparison to the other studied techniques, it is also observed that the convergence of the CA3 remains considerably fast as the system complexity increases.