Economic Dispatch with Unit Deactivation: Model and Solution

The conventional economic dispatch (ED) model does not consider the case that some units are allowed to be deactivated. In this paper, the significance of this case is discussed first. Then a new ED model is proposed to incorporate unit deactivation. In this model, the integer variables are controlled by continuous variables. An algorithm is developed to solve the new model, taking into account the transmission loss. This algorithm is implemented in a computer program. Two systems are tested. It is shown that the objective function can be further optimized, up to 12.9% compared to the conventional ED model.