Abstract
With the tendency to move toward automated home energy management systems, the cooperative capacity of the smart grid "SG" became more and more significant. Distributed generation "DG", in addition to the novel patterns of electricity production, enabled the two-way energy flow. The concern of this paper is on introducing an automated control technique for optimizing the operational performance of the DG units within the residential applications. This problem is formulated in a constrained-nonlinear optimization structure based on a detailed economic system. Genetic algorithm "GA" technique is used to solve this problem by defining the optimal settings of the DG units. Availability of two-way communication and the use of smart meters will enable online implementation and facilitate data collection within a fully automated system. Based on certain tariffs and realistic load curves, many scenarios of operation are analyzed and assessed. The results show that using optimization technique in cooperative with advanced smart meters can enhance the economic situation of the overall grid significantly. Copyright (C) 2016 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.