Artificial Immune Based Economic Load Dispatch with Valve-Point Effect

B.Vanaja, S. Hemamalini and Sishaj P. Simon

Department of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, National Institute of Technology Tiruchirappalli-620015, India E-mail: sishajpsimon@nitt.edu, 407107002@nitt.edu, eea0601@nitt.edu highly nonlinear characteristics of the units requires highly robust algorithms to avoid getting stuck at local optima [3]. The classical calculus based techniques fail in solving these types of problems. In this respect, stochastic search algorithms like genetic algorithm (GA) [4,5,6,7,8,9], evolutionary strategy (ES) [10,11,12], evolutionary programming (EP) [2,3,13], particle swarm optimization (PSO) and simulated annealing (SA) may prove to be very efficient in solving highly nonlinear ELD problem without any restrictions on the shape of the cost curves. Although these heuristic methods do not always guarantee the global optimal solution, they generally provide a fast and reasonable solution (sub optimal or near global optimal). Recent research endeavors, therefore, have been directed towards application of these techniques. Genetic algorithms (GAs) are search algorithms based on the simulated evolutionary process of natural selection and genetics. GAs are more flexible and robust than conventional methods [9]. The main disadvantages of GA are longer computation time and less guaranteed convergence. Artificial Immune System (AIS) are adaptive systems inspired by theoretical immunology and observed immune functions, principles and models, which are applied to complex problem domains. The natural immune system is a very complex system with several mechanisms for defense against pathogenic organisms [14]. The main purpose of the immune system is to recognize all cells (or molecules) within the body and categorize those cells as self or non self. When an antigen invades the body, only a few of these immune cells can recognize the invaders peptides. This recognition stimulates proliferation and differentiation of the cells that produce matching clones (or antibody). This process, called clonal expansion, generates a large population of antibody-producing cells that are specific to the antigen. The clonal expansion of immune cells results in destroying or neutralizing the antigen [15]. It also retains some of these cells in immunological memory, so that any subsequent exposure to a similar antigen leads to rapid immune response (secondary response). These biological principles of clone generation, proliferation and maturation are mimicked and incorporated into an algorithm termed, the clonal selection algorithm invariably referred as artificial immune system. This paper presents an application of AIS using clonal selection principle to solve the ELD problem.

Abstract-Economic Load Dispatch (ELD) is one of the optimization problems in power systems. Economic Load Dispatch determines the electrical power to be generated by the committed generating units in a power system so that the total generation cost of the system is minimized, while satisfying the load demand simultaneously. In this paper Artificial Immune System (AIS) based optimization approach has been applied to solve the constrained Economic Load Dispatch with valve-point effect. The developed AIS based optimization technique used total cost of generation as the objective function and represented it as the affinity measure. For illustrative purposes, the proposed AIS based technique has been applied to various test cases (consisting of 3, 13 and 40 generating units) to validate its effectiveness. The developed AIS based optimization technique (both binary coded and decimal coded) has been thoroughly investigated by varying the population size. The results of the proposed AIS based optimization technique are compared with that of Genetic Algorithm (GA) based approach. The simulation results reveal that the developed technique is easy to implement and capable of finding feasible near global optimal solution. The results substantiate the robustness, fast convergence and efficiency of the proposed methodology.

I.

INTRODUCTION

Electrical power systems are designed and operated to meet the continuous variation of power demand. In power system minimizing, the operation cost is very important. Economic Load Dispatch (ELD) is a method to schedule the power generator outputs with respect to the load demands, and to operate the power system most economically. Over the years, many efforts have been made to solve the ELD problem, incorporating different kinds of constraints or multiple objectives through various mathematical programming and optimization techniques. The conventional methods include lambda iteration method, base point and participation factor method, gradient method, etc [1]. However, these classical dispatch algorithms require the incremental cost curves to be monotonically increasing or piece-wise linear [2]. The input/output characteristics of modern units are inherently highly nonlinear (with valve-point effect, rate limits etc) and having multiple local minimum points in the cost function. Their characteristics are approximated to meet the requirements of classical dispatch algorithms leading to suboptimal solutions and therefore, resulting in huge revenue loss over the time. Consideration of

II. ECONOMIC LOAD DISPATCH PROBLEM The objective is to find the optimal solution, so that the minimum fuel cost is obtained subject to certain equality and inequality constraints. The problem may be expressed as a function which consists of the cost function and the constraints. In this work, equality constraint reflects real power balance and the inequality constraint reflects the limits of real power generation. The voltage levels and security are assumed to be constant. Mathematically, the formulation may be given as follows: Minimize,

F = Fi (Pi ) .
i =1

(1)

Where, Fi(Pi) is the fuel cost function of generating unit i and Pi is the generation output of unit i in MW. Subject to: (a) Power balance constraints (ignoring losses):

Negative Selection Algorithms, Clonal Selection Algorithm, Somatic Hypermutation etc. Clonal selection algorithm has been used to solve the ELD problem with valve point effect. This Algorithm is used by Immune system to describe the basic features of an immune response to an antigenic stimulus. The clonal selection algorithm reproduces those individuals with higher affinity and selects their improved matured offsprings. This characteristic makes the clonal selection algorithm suitable for solving complex optimization problems. When the clonal selection algorithm is implemented for solving the ELD problem, a few adaptations have to be made as follows [15]. 1) The affinity of an antibody refers to the evaluation of the objective function. 2) All antibodies are to be selected for cloning. 3) The number of clones generated by the antibodies is equal. IV. IMPLEMENTATION OF CLONAL SELECTION ALGORITHM FOR SOLVING ELD PROBLEM The clonal selection algorithm is implemented according to the following procedure: 1) Initial population is generated randomly. 2) The affinity (fitness) value of each antibody in the population set is evaluated. Clone the individuals in the population (fixed number of clones for each antibody), giving rise to a temporary population of clones. 3) The population of clones undergoes maturation process through genetic operation i.e. mutation (mutate inversely proportional to affinity). The affinity of each mutated clone is evaluated. 4) A new population of the same size as the initial population is selected from the mutated clones based on their affinity. The new population will undergo the same process as stated in steps 1- 4. The process is repeated until the solution converged to an optimum value.
A. Coding, initialization and cloning The power outputs of each generator are normalized and coded to l bit, making it possible to compose a string. S strings are randomly selected to form the initial population. Inequality constraints on the generated output are satisfied automatically in the process of normalizing and coding the initial chromosomes. Unit 1 Unit 2 .. Unit N XXXX XXXX .. XXXX
Fig. 1. Coding and initialization.

Pi PD = 0 .
i =1

(2)

Where, PD is the total real power demand in MW. (b) Generating capacity constraints Pimin Pi Pimax for i = 1,2,..,N. (3)

Where, Pimin and Pimax are the minimum and maximum output generation of unit i. The fuel cost function considering valve point effect of the generating unit is given as Fi*(Pi) = Fi(Pi) + |ei sin ( fi [Pimin Pi ])| . Fi(Pi) = ai Pi2 + bi Pi + ci . (4) (5)

Where ai , bi , ci are the fuel cost coefficients of unit i and ei and fi are the fuel cost coefficients of unit i with valve point effect. In this work, transmission line losses of the network are not considered. However, it may be calculated by an iterative algorithm or by using directly B-loss matrix of the power system. III. ARTIFICIAL IMMUNE SYSTEM The natural immune system is a complex pattern recognition system that defends the body from foreign pathogens [14, 16]. In a simple manner, it recognizes all the bodys own cells within the body as the self-cells and the foreign disease causing elements or the antigens as the non-self-cells. The non-self cells are further categorized in order to activate the suitable defense mechanism and it is unique with respect to a particular antigen. At the same time, the immune system also develops a memory to enable more efficient responses in case of further infection by the similar antigen. Hence, the natural immune system is also a source of inspiration for developing intelligent methodologies toward problem solving [17]. The few computational models developed that have been based on immune system principles are Immune Network Models,

Normalization of variables is obtained by using (6). Pi P min Pi = max i min .(2 l 1) . (6) P P i i In order to search completely, a fitness function [11] using a percentage of input variables includes equality constraints.

The individual with the lowest total cost and error has the highest fitness. Fitness value of each string is calculated using (7). Fitness = A [1 - %Cost] + B [1- %Error]. Where, A, B (> 0) are weighting coefficients Error =| Pi PD |
i =1 N

(7)

C. Halting criteria The convergence parameter is set as the situation when the best solution of each generation ceases to change. Thereby, halting criteria is taken as convergence or the number of iterations subjected to a maximum of 100 iterations.

V. SETTING OF AIS PARAMETERS As in other optimization techniques, parameters such as population size and number of clones generated by each antibody are to be determined before its implementation [15]. Setting of these AIS parameters optimally would also yield a smooth fitness convergence. It may yield better or similar fitness values in comparatively less number of generations. In this work, fixed number of clones is generated by each antibody. Finally, tournament selection is done to select same number of mutated clones as there are in initial population. A case study consisting of 13 generating units has been adapted from [2]. The effect of variation of population size is shown in Fig. 2. Hence the population size for AIS is carefully set, by performing trial run for 5 times and rounded fitness values of each generation have been taken for plotting the graph.
A. Setting of Population size If the population size is too small, then an insufficient number of samples are sampled and would not yield in the best possible solution. If the population size is too large, the algorithm becomes inefficient as more number of tests is performed than necessary for each generation. As seen from Fig. 2, population size of 200 yields a higher fitness value and when the population size is 100 and 400, it has been noticed that they all settle at the same fitness value except that smaller the population size the learning rate is fast but efficiency is lost. Thus the best possible population size is considered to be 200.

String cos t Min cos t %Cost = Max cos t Min cos t %Error = Stringerror Minerror Maxerror Minerror

String cost : individual strings cost of generation. Mincost : the minimum objective function value within the population. Maxcost : the maximum objective function value within the population. Stringerror : individual strings error in meeting the power balance constraint. Minerror : the minimum constraint error within the population. Maxerror : the maximum constraint error within the population. After calculating the fitness value for each antibody, each antibody from initial pool is copied into a fixed number of clones to generate a temporary population of clones. This population of clones has to undergo maturation process through hypermutation mechanism.
B. Hypermutation The hypermutation is carried out via fitness based hypermutation rate. Larger hypermutation rate is set for lower fitness clones and vice versa [15]. That is, the probability of hypermutation of each clone is inversely proportional to its fitness. This is followed by their fitness evaluation and penalty in case of any constraint violation. The mutation rate is not taken uniform but kept inversely proportional to the fitness value of a given clone (binary flip mutation has been utilized with the probability of mutation varying from 0. 5 to 0.1). Consequently, clones with higher fitness are made liable to undergo mutation to a lesser extent as compared to those with lower fitness. Thereafter the mutated clones are decoded into their real values followed by the evaluation of corresponding fitness. This is repeated till all the clones from the temporary clonal population are endured to mutation [16]. Finally, tournament selection is done to select same number of mutated clones as the initial population size. This completes the first iteration of the clonal selection algorithm. In the next iteration, this new population is made to undergo cloning and hypermutation as discussed above and likewise.

Fig. 2. Total cost obtained for different population sizes.

VI. RESULTS AND DISCUSSION The applicability and validity of the AIS based technique for practical applications has been tested on three different test cases. The obtained results are compared with the results obtained using decimal coded GA method as decimal coding is more effective than binary coding in evaluating the optimal solution [18]. To have an idea of average performance of these techniques each test case is solved with 5 different trial runs by each of the algorithms. All the programs are developed using Matlab 7.01 and the system configuration is Pentium IV processor with 3.2 GHz speed and 1 GB RAM.
A. Test case I This test case consisting of 3 generating units has been adapted from [2]. Based on the simulation results, the following parameters are found to be suitable: 80 members in a population pool and the number of proliferated clones are 10. The results are tabulated and they are shown in Table I.
TABLE I RESULTS OBTAINED FOR 3 GENERATING UNITS WITH VALVE POINT EFFECT Method Mean time (sec) Best time (sec) Mean cost ($/hr) Maximum cost ($/hr) Minimum cost ($/hr) AIS Binary 31.55 28.27 8244.90 8272.61 8234.14 Real 29.06 26.53 8247.11 8264.32 8234.07 GA[18] 36.50 33.07 8252.79 8271.16 8236.21

TABLE II RESULTS OBTAINED FOR 13 GENERATING UNITS WITH VALVE POINT EFFECT Method Mean time (sec) Best time (sec) Mean cost ($/hr) Maximum cost ($/hr) Minimum cost ($/hr) AIS Binary Real 68.08 65.39 62.54 61.47 18056.16 18006.35 18609.14 18093.30 17982.31 17974.42 GA[18] 78.42 76.06 18791.31 18935.83 18671.64

Fig. 4. Convergence characteristics for 13 generating units.

C. Test case III This test case consisting of 40 generating units has been adapted from [2]. Based on the simulation results, the following parameters are found to be suitable: 320 members in a population pool and the number of proliferated clones are 20. The results are tabulated and they are shown in Table III.
TABLE III RESULTS OBTAINED FOR 40 GENERATING UNITS WITH VALVE POINT EFFECT Method Mean time (sec) Best time (sec) Mean cost ($/hr) Maximum cost ($/hr) Minimum cost ($/hr) AIS Binary 1120.07 1195.35 121596.70 121865.44 121760.58 Real 1137.54 1132.19 121484.23 121502.83 121432.18 GA[18] 1167.53 1165.70 121998.70 122753.87 121523.10

Fig. 3. Convergence characteristics for 3 generating units.

From the results shown in Table I the cost of generation obtained by the proposed technique is found to be lesser than that of GA.
B. Test case II This test case consisting of 13 generating units has been adapted from [2]. Based on the simulation results, the following parameters are found to be suitable: 200 members in a population pool and the number of proliferated clones are 10. The results are tabulated and they are shown in Table II. From Table II it can be inferred that, the proposed technique is significantly faster than GA.

Fig. 5. Convergence characteristics for 40 generating units.

From Table III simulation results have shown that the proposed technique offers faster convergence and superior performance than Genetic Algorithm. VII. CONCLUSION The problem of economic load dispatch with valve-point effect has been investigated in this paper. Clonal selection based AIS technique has been applied to solve ELD problem with valve-point effect. Binary and real coded representation of the antibody attributes was implemented that represent the optimal output of the generating units. The results obtained by the proposed technique were also compared with those obtained by decimal coded Genetic Algorithm method. The simulation results have shown that Genetic Algorithm requires longer execution time and AIS based optimization technique is capable of providing better results with reduced computation time. From this limited comparative study, it can be concluded that Artificial Immune System can be a promising technique for solving complex optimization problems in power system operation. REFERENCES
[1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] A. J. Wood, B. F. Wollenberg, Power Generation, Operation and Control, John Wiley & Sons, New York, 1984. Nidul Sinha, Chakrabarthi.R and Chattopadhyay.P.K, Evolutionary Programming Techniques for Economic Load Dispatch, IEEE Transactions on evolutionary computation, Vol. 7, 2003, pp.83- 94. Nidul Sinha, Chakrabarti, P.K.Chatopadhyay, Improved Fast Evolutionary Program for Economic Load Dispatch with Non-smooth Cost Curves, IE (I) Journal.EL Vol. 85, 2004. Hiroyuki Mori, Takuya Horiguchi, Genetic Algorithm Based Approach to Economic Load Dispatching,, IEEE Transactions on power systems, Vol.1,1993, pp. 145-150. C-L. Chiang, Genetic based Algorithm for Power Economic Load Dispatch, IET Gener.Transm.Distrib, 1, (2), 2007, pp.261-269. S.H. Ling, H.K. Lam, .H.F.Leung and Y.S.Lee, Improved Genetic Algorithm for Economic Load Dispatch with Valve- Point Loadings, IEEE Transactions on power systems, Vol.1, 2003, pp. 442 447. R.Ouiddir, M.Rahli and L.Abdelhakem Korid, Economic Dispatch using Genetic Algorithm: Application to Western Algerias Electrical Power Network, Journal of Information Science and Engineering 21, 2005, pp. 659 668. Mimoun Younes, Mostafa Rahli, Economic Power Dispatch using the combination of Two Genetic Algorithms, Journal of Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Vol.6, 2006, pp.175-181. Chira Achayuthakan, S.C.Srivastava, A Genetic Algorithm Based Economic Load Dispatch Solution for Eastern Region of EGAT System having combined cycle and cogeneration plants, IEEE Transactions on power systems, Vol.1, 1998, pp.165-170. Mimoun Younes, Mostefa Rahli, Lahouri Abdelhakem Koridak, Economic power dispatch using Evolutionary Algorithm, Journal of ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING Vol.57,No.4, 2006, pp. 211-217. June Ho Park, Sung Oh Yang, Hwa Seok Lee, Young Moon Park, Economic Load Dispatch using Evolutionary Algorithms, IEEE Transactions on power systems, Vol.2, 1996, pp.441-445. Giridhar Kumaran, V.S.R.K.Mouly, Using Evolutionary Computation to solve the Economic Load Dispatch problem, IEEE Transactions on power systems, Vol.3, 2001, pp.296-301. J.H. Park, S.O.Yang and K.J. Mun, H.S.Lee J.W.Jung, An Application of Evolutionary Computations to Economic Load Dispatch with piecewise Quadratic Cost Functions, IEEE Transactions on power systems, Vol.69, 1998, pp.289-294. Leandro N. de Castro and Jonathan Timmis, Artificial Immune Systems: A New Computational Intelligence Approach, Springer, UK, 2002.

[15] T.K.A Rahman, Z.M. Yasin, W.N.W. Abdullah, Artificial immune based for solving economic dispatch in power systems, IEEE National Power and Energy Conference Proceeding, Malaysia, 2004, pp. 31-35. [16] B. K. Panigraphi, Salik R. Yadav, Shubham Agarwal, M.K. Tiwari, A clonal algorithm to solve economic load dispatch, Electric Power Systems Research 77, 2007, pp. 13811389. [17] Dipankar Dasguptha, Nii Attoh Okine, Immunity Based Systems: A Survey, IEEE Transactions on Power Systems, vol.1, 1997, pp. 369 374. [18] B. Vanaja, S. Hemamalini, Sishaj P. Simon, Genetic Algorithm Based Economic Load Dispatch with Valve-Point Effect, 10th IASTED International Conference on Power and Energy Systems (April 16-18, PES 2008)

[8] [9]

[10] [11] [12] [13]

[14]