Integrated Strategies of Backtracking Search Optimizer for Solving Reactive Power Dispatch Problem

This paper proposes backtracking search optimizer (BSO) for solving the reactive power dispatch (RPD) problem. The RPD problem is highly nonlinear, nonconvex optimization problem and is consisting of both continuous and discrete control variables. It aims to find the optimal settings of the generator voltages, tap positions of tap changing transformers, and the amount of reactive compensation that able to optimize the transmission power losses. BSO has simple structure and single control parameter. It has two new tuned mutation and crossover operators that control the amplitude of the search-direction matrix and search space boundaries. In this paper, five diversified generation strategies of mutation factor of BSO to solve the RPD. The proposed BSO strategies are applied to the IEEE standard 14-, 30-, 57-bus test systems, and a real power system at West Delta region system as a part of the unified Egyptian network. Simulation results show that the BSO strategy, which almost generates mutation factor concentrated on the mean value of the normal distribution (BSO 4) assigns multidirections through the search space and supports the diversity of populations. To show the effectiveness and superiority of proposed BSO, the obtained results are compared with different algorithms reported in the literature.