Application of Flower Pollination Algorithm for Solving Short Term Hydro Thermal Scheduling Problem with Prohibited Operating Zones

Scheduling hydro and thermal power plants in short duration is a complex optimization problem in power generation system. The main function of this scheduling approach is in nonlinear nature and aims to optimize the thermal plant's running cost by considering numerous constraints taken in power plants. In this work, an effective stochastic method called Flower pollination algorithm (FPA) is implemented to arrive at the perfect solution. This algorithm has the evolutionary characteristics of pollinating process of flowers such that fittest members will survive and the subsequent generation of the healthier flowering plants. FPA executes the levy flight transport to generate members in the successive generation. To evaluate the efficacy of this algorithm, it is put forth to a standard test case by considering hydro and thermal power plant with a time slot of twelve hours interval on three days and simulated using the MATLAB software. Prohibited operating zones are included as additional constraints. The simulation results reveal that this meta-heuristic algorithm yields best outcome in minimum executing time than the other heuristic methods.