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Abstract:The non-renewable energy resources are limited and depleting gradually. As such, energy security has attained the greatest amount of attention globally than ever before. In the meantime, energy crises are already affecting the developing countries such as Pakistan, even though one-third of the population of the country is not even not connected to the national electricity grid. The population with access to on-grid electricity is enduring load shedding of more than 12 h a day. This situation is alarming and require immediate attention is required so as to add alternative energy resources to the country, which has long been relying on imported fuels. It is, therefore, high time that the abundant potential in the renewable energy resources of Pakistan such as solar, wind, and biomass are harnessed. These renewable energy resources are economical and environmentally friendly, and thus considered as sustainable, and the utilization of these in meeting energy demands can help to conserve conventional resources early diminishing. This paper provides a detailed description of the energy consumption and load-shedding scenario in Pakistan thereby focusing specifically Sindh and Baluchistan provinces. Since, wind energy is considered one of the cost-effective renewable resources, six potential sites in these two provinces are considered in this study. These sites lie within 250 km of the southeastern and 800 km of the southwestern regions of Pakistan. One-year wind speed data have been reported for variable heights of these proposed sites which represent to have an annual average wind speed of 6.63 m/s and 5.33 m/s respectively. The power generation data for these location of two provinces is 7.653 GWh, and 5.456 GWh per annum respectively. This study also elaborates on the advantages and disadvantages of harvesting and installing the wind energy and provides a technical proposal for the generation of electricity from the wind in the selected remote zones which are off the national grid. The findings of this paper will help concerned government departments to devise appropriate policies and attract investment in the wind energy sector to eradicate the on-going electricity crisis.

Summary To alleviate the overloads in the power system and to reduce the exponential growth in carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, deployment of the renewable energy sources (RES) into the power system is the need of the hour. However, injecting these RES into the current power system network causes large voltage and power overshoots hence deteriorate the transient response and power quality of the overall power system. In this paper, an efficient solution of the above‐mentioned issues is explored by developing an optimal microgrid (MG) controller using one of the most modern and intelligent artificial intelligence (AI) techniques named the salp swarm optimization algorithm (SSA). The intelligence of the SSA is exploited to select the optimal controller gains and dc‐link capacitance value by minimizing a time integrating error fitness function (FF) which in‐turn enhances the dynamic response and power quality of the studied MG system. The proposed grid‐tied MG controller is designed to achieve the preset active and reactive power sharing ratio between distributed generator (DG) and utility grid during DG and load switching conditions. To validate the superiority of the proposed controller, its performance is compared with that of its precedent grasshopper optimization algorithm (GOA)‐based controller for the identical operating conditions and system configuration. The outcomes of the study show that the proposed MG controller outperforms its competitor in terms of transient response and quality of power.

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