Application of meta-heuristics algorithms in discrete model of steady-state load-shedding

Optimal load-shedding during contingency situations is one of the most important issues in planning, security, and operation of power systems. Load-shedding is necessary to prevent phenomena such as voltage collapse and line over load which may lead to cascade outages and then black-out. In this paper, a new optimal load-shedding approach is presented. One of the important specifications of this method is that amount of load shed from each bus is determined. In this research, studies consist of critical single line and generator outage based on contingency ranking. The optimal load-shedding is formulated as a nonlinear optimization problem subject to operation and security constraints, where objective function is the service interruption cost. Finally, the load-shedding problem is also solved by genetic and particle swarm optimization algorithms, in which weighting factors are determined using AHP method. The proposed method is tested on the IEEE 30 bus system, and the results are presented.