Solution for Multi-area Unit Commitment Problem Using PSO-Based Modified Firefly Algorithm

Abstract

A new approach applying particle swarm optimization (PSO) and firefly algorithm (FA) has been proposed for solving economic dispatch and multi-area unit commitment problems, in this paper. In FA, the flashing behavior depends on the random movement factor, which gets fixed and causes the solution to vary uncertainly. Hence, PSO algorithm is used to optimize the random movement factor of FA. Using the proposed PSO-based FA, the ON/OFF status of generating units of multi-area system is determined. The effective equality and inequality constraints are considered to solve the multi-area system. The proposed algorithm is implemented in MATLAB working platform and is applied to four areas with 26 generating unit systems for a 24-h schedule. The performance of proposed method has been compared with other recent reported results. The implication of proposed method is clarified and verified by numerical results.