A real time knowledge based recovery advisor for electrical power distribution networks

A common application of expert systems in industry is in the diagnosis of plant health status from monitored data. This paper describes an application of knowledge based techniques to aid engineers maintain electrical supplies. Such a system has been developed for use by control engineers at a Royal Naval dockyard. In the event of network failure leading to loss of supply to a ship, the system will advise the control engineer on the most desirable reconfiguration of the network which restores power to the affected boat(s). The aim of the system is to produce an electrical lineup similar to that which would be proposed by a practising control engineer. The system therefore encompasses some of the engineers `rules of thumb´, as well as obeying obvious electrical constraints. The system has three principle elements; a monitor, a recovery advisor and a network simulator, each is briefly described