qinnovision-world-challenge-2025 / Unit Commitment Problem

The unit commitment is used to determine the start-up and shut-down schedule of all production units in a power grid so that the electric demand is supplied and the total operating cost is minimized, at the same time meeting a number of system and generator constraints. Given that the energy needs to be nearly instantly consumed and having both too much as well as too little energy in the grid can lead to lasting negative effects for energy consumers, the balance is a very fine one. The use case problem is generally formulated as a large-scale mixed integer nonlinear problem and involves nonlinear cost function and the feasible solutions are combinatorial in nature.

Mathematically it is a mixed-integer quadratic programming (MIQP) problem and is NP- complete. Ref. [2] formulates a mapping of the mixed integer problem to QUBO, where they discretize the parameter space.

As part of your challenge you are being asked to provide a quantum implementation that calculates the ideal start and stop for each power unit in a power grid of a medium city with industrial sites which is supported by a hybrid set of power generators (3 renewable energy generation stations and 2 traditional energy generation stations). You will have to balance energy production costs, emissions, overall grid load, environmental factors that drive usage pattern as well as generator efficiency and reserves for spontaneous events.