A profit-based unit commitment CA for the competitive environment

As the electrical industry restructures, many of the traditional algorithms for controlling generating units need modification or replacement. Previou sly utilized to schedule generation units in a manner that minimizes costs while meeting all demand, the unit commitment (UC) algorithm must be update d. A UC algorithm that maximizes profit will play an essential role in deve loping successful bidding strategies for the competitive generator. Simply bidding to win contracts is insufficient; bidding strategies must result in contracts that, on average, cover the total generation costs. No longer gu aranteed to be the only electricity supplier, a generation company's share of the demand will be more difficult to predict than in the past, Removing the obligation to serve softens the demand constraint. In this paper the au thors provide a price/profit-based UC formulation which considers the softe r demand constraint and allocates fixed and transitional costs to the sched uled hours. The authors describe a genetic algorithm solution to this new U C problem and present results for an illustrative example.