This paper proposes a new hybrid methodology for solving the economic load dispatch problem with valve-point effect. The proposed hybrid method integrates the differential evolution (DE) with the sequential quadratic programming (SQP) technique. The DE is the global optimizer and the SQP is used to fine tune of DE run. The hybrid methodology and its variants are validated for test systems consisting of 3, 13 and 40 thermal units with incremental fuel cost function takes into account the valve-point loadings effects. The proposed hybrid method outperforms and provides quality solutions in terms of efficiency compared with those obtained from DE and SQP alone and other existing techniques for load dispatch problem with valve-point effect.
differential evolution; sequential quadratic programming; economic load dispatch; valve-point effect; hybrid optimization method
