Optimal energy management of microgrid using advanced multi-objective particle swarm optimization Ho Pham Huy Anh Faculty of Electrical Electronics Engineering (FEEE), Ho Chi Minh City University of Technology – VNU-HCM, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, and Cao Van Kien Faculty of Electronics Technology, Industrial University of Ho Chi Minh City, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam Abstract Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to propose an optimal energy management (OEM) method using intelligent optimization techniques applied to implement an optimally hybrid heat and power isolated microgrid. The microgrid investigated combines renewable and conventional power generation. Design/methodology/approach – Five bio-inspired optimization methods include an advanced proposed multi-objective particle swarm optimization (MOPSO) approach which is comparatively applied for OEM of the implemented microgrid with other bio-inspired optimization approaches via their comparative simulation results. Findings – Optimal multi-objective solutions through Pareto front demonstrate that the advanced proposed MOPSO method performs quite better in comparison with other meta-heuristic optimization methods. Moreover, the proposed MOPSO is successfully applied to perform 24-h OEM microgrid. The simulation results also display the merits of the real time optimization along with the arbitrary of users’ selection as to satisfy their power requirement. Originality/value – This paper focuses on the OEM of a designed microgrid using a newly proposed modified MOPSO algorithm. Optimal multi-objective solutions through Pareto front demonstrate that the advanced proposed MOPSO method performs quite better in comparison with other meta-heuristic optimization approaches. Keywords Optimal energy management, Hybrid microgrid, Multi-objective genetic algorithm, Multi-objective particle swarm optimization algorithm, 24-hour optimal energy management simulations, Bio-inspired optimization methods Paper type Research paper Nomenclature Symbol – Description ALO = Ant-Lion optimization algorithm; CHP = Combined heat and power; DER = Distributed energy resources; This paper is totally funded by Vietnam National Foundation for Science and Technology Development (NAFOSTED), under grant MDT 107.01-2018.10. Optimal energy management of microgrid 2085 Received 5 May 2019 Revised 16 October 2019 25 November 2019 Accepted 11 January 2020 Engineering Computations Vol. 37 No. 6, 2020 pp. 2085-2110 © Emerald Publishing Limited 0264-4401 DOI 10.1108/EC-05-2019-0194 The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at: https://www.emerald.com/insight/0264-4401.htm