Browsing by Author "Schlunz, E. B."
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- ItemThe application of a computerised decision support system for generator maintenance scheduling : a South African case study(Southern African Institute for Industrial Engineering, 2012-11) Schlunz, E. B.; Van Vuuren, J. H.In the generator maintenance scheduling (GMS) problem, a schedule is sought for the planned maintenance outages of generating units in a power system. The GMS model considered in this paper is formulated as a mixed-integer quadratic program assuming a reliability objective, subject to certain constraints. A generic GMS solution methodology is derived, capable of solving general GMS problem instances that conform to this model structure, and implemented in a computerised decision support system. The decision support system is then used to solve a real-life case study in the South African national power system.
- ItemAn investigation into the effectiveness of simulated annealing as a solution approach for the generator maintenance scheduling problem(Elsevier Ltd, 2013-04) Schlunz, E. B.; Van Vuuren, J. H.The generator maintenance scheduling (GMS) problem is the difficult combinatorial optimisation problem of finding a schedule for the planned maintenance outages of generating units in a power system. The GMS model considered in this paper is formulated as a mixed integer program, with a reliability optimality criterion, subject to a number of constraints. A new version of the simulated annealing (SA) method for solving the GMS problem is presented. Four cooling schedules (the geometric and three adaptive schedules), two neighbourhood move operators (an elementary move and an ejection chain move operator), and a hybrid local search heuristic/SA algorithm are compared. To our knowledge, this is the first study considering a different SA cooling schedule and move operator in a GMS context. A new 32-unit GMS test system is established and used in conjunction with a benchmark test system from the literature in this investigation. It is found that choosing a different cooling schedule and an ejection chain move operator yield improved results to that of the SA algorithm currently employed in the GMS literature. The hybrid SA algorithm performs very well compared to other methods on the benchmark test system from the literature, and an improved lower bound on the objective function value is presented for this test system.
- ItemAn optimisation-based decision support system framework for multi-objective in- core fuel management of nuclear reactor cores(Southern African Institute for Industrial Engineering, 2016-11-06) Schlunz, E. B.; Bokov, P. M.; Van Vuuren, J. H.ENGLISH ABSTRACT: The notion of in-core fuel management (ICFM) involves decision making in respect of the specific arrangement of fuel assemblies in a nuclear reactor core. This arrangement, referred to as a reload configuration, influences the efficiency and effectiveness of fuel usage in a reactor. A decision support system (DSS) may assist nuclear reactor operators in improving the quality of their reload configuration designs. In this paper, a generic optimisation-based DSS framework is proposed for multi-objective ICFM, with the intention of serving as a high-level formalisation of a computerised tool that can assist reactor operators in their complex ICFM decisions.