Performance of a Newly Developed Hybrid APO–PSO Metaheuristic for Monitoring of Intelligent Transformer

Maintaining the safety and continuity of contemporary power systems depends critically on the accurate diagnosis of transformer failures. The most widely used diagnostic approach is still dissolved gas analysis (DGA); nevertheless, traditional ratio-based techniques, such as the Rogers’ ratio, rely on predefined thresholds and sometimes exhibit limited flexibility and unclear judgments under varied operating circumstances. This study suggests an optimization-oriented diagnostic approach that uses sophisticated metaheuristic algorithms to adaptively modify DGA gas ratio limitations in order to overcome these shortcomings. Four optimization schemes are formulated and comparatively assessed: the Artificial Protozoa Optimizer (APO), a hybrid Genetic Algorithm–Ant Colony Optimization model (GA–ACO), a hybrid Particle Swarm–Grey Wolf Optimization model (PSO–GWO), and a newly developed hybrid APO–PSO model. A dataset of 500 real-world DGA samples is used to evaluate the algorithms, and each optimization technique is conducted across 50 separate runs. The analysis focuses on statistical consistency, robustness, convergence characteristics, and diagnostic accuracy. With an average classification accuracy of around 96–97%, the suggested hybrid APO–PSO model outperforms standalone APO by about 2–3%, GA–ACO by 1–2%, and PSO–GWO by 1–2%, according to the numerical data. Furthermore, the APO–PSO scheme achieves more consistent behavior over repeated trials, reduced fitness variation, and quicker convergence. The statistical significance of these improvements is confirmed by statistical validation using the Friedman test and the Wilcoxon signed-rank test at a significance threshold of p < 0.05. Overall, the combination of APO’s strong global exploration with PSO’s efficient local exploitation produces a robust and adaptive diagnostic approach. The proposed framework enhances fault discrimination capability, reduces the likelihood of misclassification, and is suitable for both offline fault analysis and online transformer condition monitoring applications.