Double population cooperation constrained multi-objective optimization for flood control and power generation scheduling in cascade reservoirs

Water is the source of life. The management and efficient utilization of water resources are central concerns for society. The optimal scheduling of cascade reservoir systems plays an indispensable role in all aspects of water resource regulation. In response to the practical demands of flood control and power generation during the flood season, we constructed a flood control and power generation optimization scheduling model aimed at minimizing the water level at the dam front and the sum of squared discharge flows of the cascade reservoirs. To solve this model, the Double Population Cooperation Constrained NSGA-II (DPCCNSGA-II) algorithm was developed. The algorithm introduces an improved population initialization strategy, an adaptive non-dominated sorting strategy specifically designed for double population cooperation, and a rotation-based crossover operator. To validate the effectiveness of the proposed algorithm, it was applied to the real-world scheduling problem of the cascade reservoirs in the Huangbai River Basin. The experimental results demonstrate the superior performance of the algorithm in both benchmark tests and practical applications.