EE Computer Applications

Week 5
 Design and Construction
• This function includes all routine applications
associated with the design and construction of
power plants, transmission facilities, substations,
service centers, and distribution facilities. Electric
utility companies on average spend more for new
construction each year than any other industry.
Although their primary objective is the usual
production and sale of a product, they must be
concerned with a large capital investment program.
Efficient planning, scheduling, and control of labor
and material resources are necessary if customer
demand is to be met and at the same time a fair
rate of return is to be provided on the investment
 Design and Construction
• Major Programs. Design and construction is a
multidiscipline activity that employs computer
applications dealing with electrical, mechanical, and
civil engineering functions.
– The tower analysis program provides a summary of the
maximum tension and maximum compression for each
member of a three-dimensional structure over the entire
load range specified.
– Line sag calculates sag and tension of conductors under a
given situation.
– Branch circuit design uses the load, distance, number of
cables in a raceway, wire temperature rating, motor-
starting, and full-load amps to compute the voltage drops
and sizes of breakers, cable, and conduit in a circuit.
– Structural design programs are used to design concrete and
steel structures using as input the structure configuration
and loads such as floor, roof, and impact.
 Design and Construction
– The structural steel framing program is used to design the beams,
columns, girders, and baseplates of power plant structures.
– The foundation-slab analysis program is used to design large,
complex foundation mats. The results permit evaluation of various
slab thicknesses, soil bearing pressures, shears and bending
moments, and reinforcement areas.
– The concrete stack analysis program is used to analyze proposed
stacks by determining loadings, resulting stresses, and required
steel reinforcement. This program is used extensively in the
design of very tall concrete stacks selected for new power plants.
– Piping programs are used to perform stress analysis of piping
systems and determine hanger design information. The power
plant piping program analyzes the flexibility of a piping system
under the influence of temperature.
 Design and Construction
– The cable routing program provides the shortest cable route
between nodes, percent raceway fill, and number of cables in a
tray or raceway.
– Interference analysis resolves the interference between pipe,
cable tray, and structures occupying the same space.
– The heating, ventilating, and air-conditioning design program uses
thermal loads and the building configuration to calculate the size
of refrigeration equipment and ductwork required.
– Fluid dynamics analysis analyzes piping systems for pressure drop,
flow distribution, and power requirements.
– Hydrologic analysis is used to determine seepage flow networks,
underground flow, and rainfall and runoff drainage for culvert and
bridge size and design.
– Earthwork design is used to design embankments and roadways
and perform settlement and embankment stability analysis.
– Geotechnical evaluation is used to evaluate soil testing results and
determine the strength and swell of soil for dam and foundation
design.
 Design and Construction
– Drafting includes engineering sketches and standard
symbols used to lay out a drawing on a terminal and
the results are printed or plotted. Included in this
application are computer-aided design and drafting
packages.
– Economic analysis is used to make economic decisions
between alternative sets of system designs or
equipment. Most of the preceding applications require
common data. The trend is to treat the data as a
corporate resource and to capture and maintain them
in a common database. This provides for consistency of
data, avoids duplication, and minimizes errors due to
entry of the same data in different programs. This
common database can then be used by many of the
design and construction programs.
 Design and Construction
• Distribution Construction Information
System. This application supports the
management of new investment and
maintenance in the distribution area.
– The term distribution construction refers to the
entire process of work requesting, design,
scheduling, reporting, and closing of that
portion of the facilities closest in service to
customers. New distribution work stems from
three types of activity: system maintenance
and improvement requirements, customer
requests, and inspections or surveys.
 Design and Construction
• Distribution Facilities Information System. This
application provides the information required to plan,
control, maintain, locate, account for, and manage the
distribution facilities of an electric utility. It is also
referred to as an automated mapping and facilities
management system. When combined with terrain and
other landmark information, it is referred to as a
geographic information system(GIS). It is composed of a
graphics system and a database system.
• Material-Management Information System. This
system is used to plan for and control the flow of
materials in and out of the company. A material items
database may be accessed by many departments for
multiple purposes. The main subsystems are stores
operations, materials planning, and purchasing.
• Stores operations relates to all day-to-day activities within the
warehouse location. Included in these are functions such as stock
inquiry handling, recording of stores transactions (receipts, issues),
item location management, order and requisition initiation, and
material reservation and allocation control.
• Materials planning refers to the control and management of an
inventory, both repairable and expendable parts. The functions
under this application are acquisition analysis, item forecasting,
materials requirements planning, reporting, and stock taking
control.
• The purchasing area includes the functions of ordering material
from the suppliers and transferring to the inventory on receipt of
the material. The functions within this are purchase order writing,
quotation preparation, receiving, returns, implementation, quality
assurance, vendor performance analysis, and invoice matching.
 Project Management
• The objective of project management is to control project
costs and schedules in the maintenance and construction
of power system facilities. Power engineers have used
manual project information systems for years. Now there
is rapid movement to automation of project control with
provisions for on-line display and edit of results.
 Project Management
• Project management in the engineering
departments includes project control, project
scheduling, and resource optimization tools.
These tools are required to manage small
procurement projects. However, they also
could be major, long-term projects such as
construction of a facility, installation of a major
program, or daily tracking of activities within a
department. Automated techniques, taking
into consideration the control of time,
resources, and costs, allow more productive
utilization of project management personnel
and stricter control of projects than manual
methods. There are three major components
of a project management system:
 Project Management
1.Critical-path method. A network represents a project
which consists of a mixture of serial and parallel activities
and employs a combination of personnel resources,
materials, and facilities. When time is associated with each
activity within a network, critical-path methodology can
be used to analyze the network and determine the longest
time path to completion of the project. All other time
paths through the network will then have some slack in
terms of the critical path.
2.Resource management. Project management and
scheduling provides the means to plan and control a
variety of projects. These systems permit tasks to be
scheduled, resources assigned, costs allocated, and
progress reported. Using this process, management can
address identified problem areas and adjust its plans
accordingly.
• 3.Project costing and estimating. Cost control
techniques involve the ability to estimate and
assign costs for labor, material, facilities, test
equipment, and other resources to all activities
comprising the execution of all phases of a
project. In addition, some application programs
permit extending rates; accommodate matrix and
other organization structures; compute general,
administrative, and overhead expenses; and
summarize project costs over selected parts of
projects as well as multiproject group
 Reference
• STANDARD HANDBOOK FOR ELECTRICAL
ENGINEERS 14th Edition