1992 Problem B: An Emergency Power Restoration System

Power companies serving coastal regions must have emergency response systems for power outages due to storms.  Such systems require the input of data that allow the time and cost required for restoration to be estimated and the “value” of the outage judged by objective criteria.  In the past, Hypothetical Electric Company (HECO) possesses a computerized database with real time access to service calls that currently require the following information:

You are a consultant to HEPO power company. HECO possesses a computerized database with real time access to service calls that currently require the following information.

Time of report; Type of requester; Estimated number of people affected; Location (x,y).

Crew sites are located at coordinates (0,0) and (40, 40), where x and y are in miles.  The region serviced by HECO is within –65 < x < 65 and –50 < y < 50.  The region is largely metropolitan with an excellent road network.  Crews must return to dispatch site only at beginning and end of shift. 

Company policy requires that no work be initiated until the storm leaves the area, unless the facility is a commuter railroad or hospital, which may be processed immediately if crews are available.

HECO has hired you to develop the objective criteria and schedule the work for the storm restoration requirements listed in Table 1 (only partially recreated here) using the work force described in Table 2.  Note that the first call was received at 4:20 a.m. and that the storm left the area at 6:00 a.m.  Also note that many outages were not reported until much later in the day.

HECO has asked for a technical report for their purposes and an “exclusive summary” in laymen’s terms that can be presented to the media.  Further, they would like recommendations for the future.  To determine your prioritized scheduling system, you will have to make additional assumptions.  Detail those assumptions.  In the future, you may desire additional data.  If so, detail the information desired.