Summary The indeterminate characteristics of solar, wind sources, and load make modern AC microgrids highly complex and cause frequency fluctuations. It is very much required to maintain power equilibrium among generation and demand by planning a suitable frequency regulation controller. Henceforth, this research presents a maiden application of a hybrid Harris hawks optimization and pattern Search s (hHHO‐PS)‐based type‐2 fractional order fuzzy PID (T2FFOPID) controller for frequency regulation of an AC microgrid. Initially, a PID controller is considered, and the effectiveness of hHHO‐PS technique is compared with original Harris hawks optimization (HHO) as well as genetic algorithm (GA) and particle swarm optimization (PSO) techniques. In the next stage, superiority of proposed T2FFOPID over PID, type‐1 fuzzy PID (T1FPID), and fuzzy fractional order PID (T1FFOPID) controller is demonstrated. To authenticate the effectiveness of the suggested control method, different load disturbances as well as various rates of solar and wind sources penetration have been considered. The suggested control approach displays significant improvement in dynamic responses with fast damping of oscillations. Investigations of results affirm the better performance of T2FFOPID over other controllers regarding minutest error criteria and undershoot/overshoot of frequency deviations at various disturbances. Additionally, sensitivity analysis validates the robust conduct of T2FFOPID controller under variations parameters and communication delay. Finally, the MATLAB simulation results are validated in the OPAL‐RT OP5700 RCP/HIL FPGA real‐time simulator for practical feasibility of the proposed work.

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