Optimization techniques for capital planning in hydro operations

Hydro asset managers are often faced with the need to select one capital investment or project over another, based on which investment brings the highest value to the corporation and/or mitigates the most asset-related risk. This article explores the usefulness of advanced optimization techniques, such as the Simplex method, for large portfolios of candidate asset investments subject to multiple time-variant and risk-informed constraints, as are typically found in hydro operations.