Robust economic dispatch considering automatic generation control with affine recourse process

•A novel robust economic dispatch approach is proposed.•The system operating security and economics are optimized simultaneously.•The effective acceptable disturbance range is proposed to optimize the security.•The conservative level of the solution can be tuned by introduced guarantee ratio.•A simplified linear model with high computation efficiency is deduced.

A robust economic dispatch (ED) considering automatic generation control (AGC) with affine recourse process is proposed in this paper. The approach co-optimizes the base points and participation factors of the AGC units using preemptive goal programming and robust optimization while considering the uncertain nodal power injections and the network constraints. The proposed approach is realized by two steps. The aim of the first step is to maximize the system effective acceptable disturbance range (EADR) while minimize the generation costs and reserve costs with respect to the obtained EADR in the second step. The novelty of the approach is as follows: (a) The security of the power system is optimized by maximizing the system EADR. The approach can obtain a solution which can cover the disturbance as much as possible even when the system does not have enough adjustable capacity to cover it all. The obtained nodal EADR can quantitatively represent the anti-disturbance capability of a node. (b) The economics of the system is significantly improved by minimizing the generation costs and reserve costs while the constraint of EADR requirement is respected. (c) The conservative level of the solution can be tuned according to the user’s requirements. A simplified one-step linear model is also deduced. The effectiveness and validity of the proposed approach are demonstrated by a 6-bus system, the IEEE 118-bus system, and a real 445-bus system.