Fractional order fuzzy-PID control of a combined cycle power plant using Particle Swarm Optimization algorithm with an improved dynamic parameters selection

The effectiveness of the Particle Swarm Optimization (PSO) algorithm in solving any optimization problem is highly dependent on the right selection of tuning parameters. A better control parameter improves the flexibility and robustness of the algorithm. In this paper, a new PSO algorithm based on dynamic control parameters selection is presented in order to further enhance the algorithm's rate of convergence and the minimization of the fitness function. The powerful Dynamic PSO (DPSO) uses a new mechanism to dynamically select the best performing combinations of acceleration coefficients, inertia weight, and population size. A fractional order fuzzy-PID (fuzzy-FOPID) controller based on the DPSO algorithm is proposed to perform the optimization task of the controller gains and improve the performance of a single-shaft Combined Cycle Power Plant (CCPP). The proposed controller is used in speed control loop to improve the response during frequency drop or change in loading. The performance of the fuzzy-FOPID based DPSO is compared with those of the conventional PSO, Comprehensive Learning PSO (CLPSO), Heterogeneous CLPSO (HCLPSO), Genetic Algorithm (GA), Differential Evolution (DE), and Artificial Bee Colony (ABC) algorithm. The simulation results show the effectiveness and performance of the proposed method for frequency drop or change in loading. (C) 2017 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.