Stokelj - Soske Elektrarne Nova Gorica, Nova Gorica, Slovenia
Golob - University of LjubIjana, Ljubljana, Slovenia

With 35% of total power generation provided by its three cascaded hydro systems, scheduling of hydro power plants plays a very important role in optimizing the performance of Slovenian power system. In the paper, an improved procedure for short term operational planning is presented. This paper focuses on hydro subproblem, i.e. how to schedule individual hydro plants for maximizing the value of stored water at the end of study period. Moreover, a software package that is to be integrated into existing EMS in the local control centers is presented. It consists of three main modules: water inflow forecasting, detailed simulation of cascaded hydro system and optimal scheduling module. The proposed procedure has been tested against a number of operational scenarios for a real cascaded hydro system and important improvements in system operating efficiency have been observed.

Evolutionary programming, Power-system control, Optimization