Optimal Economic Dispatch Strategy for Cascade Hydropower Stations Considering Electric Energy and Peak Regulation Markets

With the evolution of the power market and the increase in the new energy penetration rate, the power industry will present diversified characteristics. The continuous development of the electric energy market (EEM) and the peak regulation market (PRM) is also affecting the economic benefits of cascade hydropower stations, in which the EEM, as a market for electric energy trading in the power market, develops synergistically with the PRM and creates the conditions for the consumption of new energy sources; for this reason, this paper, while considering the benefits of cascade hydropower stations in the EEM in different time scales and the impact of the spot market, combines the compensation mechanism and apportionment principle of the PRM. This paper proposes an optimal economic scheduling strategy for cascade hydropower stations. Specifically, firstly, the strategy adopts multi-objective optimization. The objective function takes into account the generation capacity of the cascade hydropower stations, the benefits of the EEM, the influence of the spot market, the compensatory benefits of peaking, and the sharing expenses of peaking; secondly, the constraints at the level of the power grid, the level of the cascade hydropower stations, and the level of the market are taken into account comprehensively, and the Harris Hawk Algorithm is used to solve the model; lastly, by comparing different schemes, it is observed that under varying inflow conditions, the proposed dispatch strategy in this paper yields slightly lower revenue in the EEM than other schemes. However, due to its comprehensive consideration of the synergy between the PRM and the EEM, its overall economic benefits surpass those of other schemes. This fully validates the effectiveness and economic efficiency of the proposed dispatch strategy.