Survey on applications of particle swarm optimization in electric power systems

The paper presents a survey of particle swarm optimization (PSO) applications in electric power systems. PSO, a novel population based stochastic optimizer with faster convergence speed and simpler implementation than genetic algorithm and ant colony optimization, has been successfully applied to solve electric power optimization problems such as optimal power flow, economic dispatch, reactive power dispatch, unit commitment, generation and transmission planning, maintenance scheduling, state estimation, model identification, load forecasting, control, and others. The primary objective of the paper is to provide a summary of PSO-based optimization method used in electric power system. Both recent developments and further research trends of the area are presented in detail.