Ecological scheduling model of the Wujiang River cascaded hydropower reservoirs based on improving the DE algorithm

ABSTRACT To protect the aquatic ecological system of the Wujiang River, ecological scheduling is carried out for the cascaded hydropower reservoirs along the river. This aims to achieve a win-win situation by minimizing the negative impact on the ecological environment while harnessing the economic benefits of the cascaded hydropower reservoirs. First, to address the slow convergence and susceptibility to local optima issues of the differential evolution algorithm, a new methodology was developed: a differential evolution algorithm with chaotic opposition-based initialization (COI) and average mutation update-based strategy (AMU). Second, an optimization model for the cascaded hydropower reservoir's ecological scheduling was constructed, dividing it into two modes: the daily average control mode and the instantaneous control mode. The Wujiang River cascaded hydropower reservoir's ecological scheduling optimization model was solved using the proposed differential evolution algorithm with COI and AMU. The results indicate that the proposed algorithm exhibits superior optimization capabilities and is more suitable for solving the cascaded hydropower reservoir's ecological scheduling optimization model. Studies demonstrate that adopting different ecological scheduling control modes for the Wujiang River cascaded hydropower reservoirs not only ensures power generation benefits but also enhances the ecological benefits of the Wujiang River cascade hydropower reservoirs.