Transitions from Analog to Digital Computing in Electric Power Systems

Cohn, Julie

doi:10.1109/mahc.2015.37

Cited by 8 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 29 publications

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“…In summary, it would be hard to discern any single digital 'revolution' in the control room space, since so many different digitalizations in the plural meshed into the work. Digital technologies were all-pervasive as they arguably have been in grid management since the 1950s (Cohn, 2015). This argument is different from the notion of co-existing computerized tools with other tools (such as paper maps) (Pettersson et al, 2004), since the very digitalization is not one single entity.…”

Section: Against Grand Diagnoses Of Current Infrastructuresmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In our field of infrastructure studies, it is plausible to assume that certain aspects of control rooms have been changed by digital tools and associated new market-based relationships. Yet some control room practices have changed remarkably little, partially because they have been 'digitalized' since the 1950s (Cohn, 2015) and because control rooms have continued to amass digital solutions from different periods. To grasp the effects of new technologies on (the transformation of) control room work thus demands nuanced empirical attention to cooperative interaction in situ.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Habits Over Routines: Remarks on Control Room Practices and Control Room Studies

Silvast

Virtanen

Abram

2022

Comput Supported Coop Work

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The evolution of computer tools has had profound impacts on many aspects of control rooms and control room studies. In this paper, we discuss some key assumptions underpinning these studies based on a new case of the electricity distribution control rooms, where the reliability of the electricity infrastructure is managed by a combination of planning and real-time maintenance. Some of these practices have changed remarkably little over the past decades – partially because they have been considered to have been ‘digitalized’ since the 1950s and have continued to amass digital solutions from different periods. Hence, the gradual transformation of control room work demands nuanced attention, both conceptual and empirical. To outline a framework for this work, we provide a conceptualization of organizational routines, habits, and reflectivity and synthesize existing CSCW and control room literature. We then present an empirical study that demonstrates our concepts and shows how they can be applied to study cooperative work. By addressing these aims the paper complements, and advances, the important topics recognized in this special theme issue and hence develops new research openings in CSCW. We address the necessity to avoid implicit determinism when analyzing new digital support tools and suggest focusing on how working habits mediate social changes, distribution, and decentralization in representing the power distribution in control rooms.

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Section: Against Grand Diagnoses Of Current Infrastructuresmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Habits Over Routines: Remarks on Control Room Practices and Control Room Studies

Silvast

Virtanen

Abram

2022

Comput Supported Coop Work

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“…Before the availability of digital computers to calculate optimal dispatch, power systems used analog computers that (check Cohn book here_ Greater computing power and advances in calculation techniques, chiefly linear programing, extended the capacity of controllers to realize lowest cost dispatch on an every-growing and diversifying grid (J. Cohn 2015). Dispatch starts months in advance, with load forecasts based on weather forecasts, economic analyses, historic growth, new construction of plants and planned outages or retirements of existing plants.…”

Section: Control For Growthmentioning

confidence: 99%

Redistributing Agency

Breslau¹

2020

History of Political Economy

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The article traces the development of “spot pricing” for electrical power, which has provided the technique for calculating electricity prices in wholesale markets in most of the United States, and is rapidly becoming the standard in many other countries. The model was first formalized by a group of engineers and economists associated with the engineering professor Fred Schweppe, at MIT. From his position as a leading control theorist, well known in the industry, Schweppe proposed an expansion of control theory that he argued would help break the deadlock in regulatory politics and benefit producers and consumers of power alike. He introduced the approach, which he called “homeostatic control,” around 1978 in a seminar of the MIT Energy Lab. Derived by way of a biological metaphor, homeostatic control conceives of a self-correcting system that maintains its equilibrium state in the face of a changing environment. Schweppe’s group envisioned bringing consumers of power into the control system by constantly feeding them signals in the form of prices. The MIT team discovered through the contact between economists and engineers that the calculation for determining efficient prices is identical to the calculation used by engineers for meeting system load while minimizing costs. The Lagrange multipliers, or lambdas, derived from the engineering optimization are the best estimates of the marginal cost, and therefore the efficient prices, at each node of the system.

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Inventing an Analog Past and a Digital Future in Computing

Kline

2019

History of Computing

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Transitions from Analog to Digital Computing in Electric Power Systems

Cited by 8 publications

References 29 publications

Habits Over Routines: Remarks on Control Room Practices and Control Room Studies

Habits Over Routines: Remarks on Control Room Practices and Control Room Studies

Redistributing Agency

Inventing an Analog Past and a Digital Future in Computing

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