Feasible operation region for dynamic economic dispatch and reserve monitoring

A large amount of renewable energy penetration will cause serious problem in load dispatch in the future power system, where the percentage of controllable generators will decrease, while disturbances will become large, rapid and uncertain. The role of economic dispatch is changing in order to make best use of the ramp-rate capability of generating units. This paper proposes a concept of feasible operation region (FOR) for dynamic economic dispatch (DED) problem. FOR is defined as the region within that the committed generating units are able to operate while matching the predicted load profile. The computation of FOR can detect possible power imbalance and also can provide accurately the spinning reserves with respect to time. Therefore, the monitoring of FOR with the reserve management on line is quite effective. Then, the paper suggests two step computation method as a new approach for DED. The first step is the computation of FOR for each generator using the most recent real-time prediction for load as well as renewable energy generation, while preserving adequate reserves. The second step is to determine generation schedule inside FOR, where any conventional real-time load dispatch method is useful. The method can specify the amount of reserve required to be called into operation to guarantee reliable load dispatch under restricted circumstances in the future. Copyright (c) 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.