Development of a Software Module of Intra-Plant Optimization for Short-Term Forecasting of Hydropower Plant Operating Conditions

The paper deals with the problem of optimizing the unit commitment and loading of hydro units at a hydropower plant. The optimal operating conditions of the hydropower plant equipment will ensure the required power quality in the peak area of the load schedule and increase the efficiency of the power plant. The problem of uneven loading of hydro units is relevant because of differences in equipment parameters, flow characteristics or uneven physical wear of hydropower plant elements. To improve the quality of optimization, it is required to verify the hydro unit parameters and their flow characteristics. The paper analyzes the methods of intra-plant optimization of unit commitment and presents the main optimization criteria, operational and technological constraints. The authors also propose an optimization algorithm and its software implementation using Matlab software. The algorithm was verified using the Sayano-Shushensky hydropower complex that includes two plants in a cascade. The software module provides three options for calculating the optimal unit commitment and loading of hydro units: optimization of instantaneous values, optimization on a daily interval, and optimization on a daily interval with the constraint on the number of start-stop operations.