Forecasting nonlinear time series of energy consumption using a hybrid dynamic model

Energy consumption is an important index of the economic development of a country. Rapid changes in industry and the economy strongly affect energy consumption. Although traditional statistical approaches yield accurate forecasts of energy consumption, they may suffer from several limitations such as the need for large data sets and the assumption of a linear formula. This work describes a novel hybrid dynamic approach that combines a dynamic grey model with genetic programming to forecast energy consumption. This proposed approach is utilized to forecast energy consumption because of its excellent accuracy, applicability to cases with limited data sets and ease of computability using mathematical software. Two case studies of energy consumption demonstrate the reliability of the proposed model. Computational results indicate that the proposed approach outperforms other models in forecasting energy consumption. Crown Copyright (C) 2012 Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.