Maiden coordinated load frequency control strategy for ST-AWEC-GEC-BDDG-based independent three-area interconnected microgrid system with the combined effect of diverse energy storage and DC link using BOA-optimised PFOID controller

This work presents a maiden approach of coordinated frequency control of novel solar tower (ST)-Archimedes wave energy conversion (AWEC)-geothermal energy conversion (GEC)-biodiesel driven generator (BDDG)-energy storage (ES) units and direct current (DC) links based independent three-area interconnected microgrid system (ImGS). A recent metaheuristic technique, named butterfly optimisation algorithm (BOA) is applied to obtain the optimal gains of the controllers employed with the ImGS and system participation factors. The dynamic performance of proportional–integral derivative (PID), PID with filter (PIDN), proportional–fractional-order integral derivative (PFOID) controllers with their gains tuned by different algorithms such as particle swarm optimisation (PSO), firefly algorithm (FA), whale optimisation algorithm (WOA), and BOA have been compared. Further, the effect of ES units and DC links in all the areas is analysed first time in ImGS. The results have established the superiority of the BOA-based PFOID controllers under different real-world scenarios in terms of frequency deviation, tie-line power, and objective functions. Finally, rigorous sensitivity analysis has been conducted to evaluate the superiority of BOA-optimised PFOID controller towards preserving system stability of ImGS with ±25% change in synchronising tie-line coefficients and bias values, and +20% change in loading condition without resetting the nominal condition gain values.