Automatic priority of the maintenance activities in distribution systems using multicriterial analysis and fuzzy techniques

Problems of planning maintenance, development and reconstruction of distribution networks have an important role in the routine of any concessionary. Several alternatives for improvement of the distribution networks considering technical, financial and operational characteristics of the concessionary cannot be done under similar basis. These approaches, as for example: reduction of losses, improvement of energy quality, reliability level, minimization of investments and operational expenses, among others, have different natures. The purpose of this paper is to use a multicriterial method of decision making with fuzzy techniques to identify maintenance services priority in electrical feeders. The final aim is to promote the ranking of several feeders in function of the maintenance urgency considering approaches of several natures. Such approaches can be either quantitative, such as reliability, quality of energy, power losses, among others, or qualitative, such as access to the feeder, vegetation presence, possibility of vandalism, seasonal loading, among others. The algorithm allows joining several operational characteristics of the system considering their importance levels in a "flexible" way. In this case, the "level of flexibility" can be defined through opinion of the concessionary specialists, who are their own employees, technicians and engineers with enough system experience since they contribute in the decision making process. Quantification of the priority factors is translated to numeric values from their natural values through the use of fuzzy techniques.