Evolutionary Computing Techniques for Optimal Reactive Power Dispatch: An Overview and Key Issues

Optimal reactive power dispatch (ORPD) is carried out to reduce losses, to improve the voltage profile and voltage stability in a power system. In recent years, several evolutionary computing based optimization techniques to solve optimal reactive power dispatch problem has been proposed. These techniques include genetic algorithm (GA), artificial bee colony (ABC), particle swarm optimization (PSO) and differential evolution (DE) etc. The ORPD problem has been solved as a single objective as well as multi-objective optimization problem using these techniques. This paper presents a brief literature review of the work carried out by the various researchers in this field by using evolutionary computing based techniques.