Ramp rate handling strategies in Dynamic Economic Load Dispatch (DELD) problem using Grey Wolf Optimizer (GWO)

This article presents multiple strategies to handle ramp rate in dynamic economic load dispatch (DELD) problem. DELD is a power system optimization problem that tackles the dispatch of thermal generators over a period of 24 h under numerous constraints like power balance, ramp rate, rippling effect and generator limits. All these constraints make DELD highly non-linear, complex, multi-dimensional and computationally intensive. In our research, we have devised unique ramp rate handling strategies and employed grey wolf optimizer (GWO) to implement them in MATLAB environment for the solution of IEEE standard 5-unit DELD system. GWO is a meta-heuristic optimization algorithm that has extensive global exploration and strong local exploitation capabilities. Addition of ramp rate handling strategies to the solution of DELD by GWO yielded diverse results. Each of these was statistically analyzed and the best results were compared with other techniques cited in the literature. Comparison indicated improvement in cost and solution time.