Design tool generates substation interlock schemes

Abstract

The power of object-oriented programming in a Windows environment has been used to design a software application that automatically generates switching schemes that satisfy specified interlocking criteria. The application has two components, one for generating interlocking schemes from substation data and the other for generating switching instructions and implementing them. The connectivity of substations, parameters of switches and components, and interlocking constraints are used by the software as input data. While this generalised tool expedites the development of interlocking schemes, its use is not limited to specific substation configurations. Three out of the many designs prepared are presented in this paper to demonstrate its usefulness.