Expert System for Icing Prediction and Ice Melting Control

Atmospheric icing may have a great impact on the overall design and safety running of power transmission lines or railway contact wires. For engineers attempting to determine ice loads in a specific area, knowledge of historical ice events and ice type for that area would he extremely valuable information. However, there is no systematic ice accretion database that can he used to help engineers. The prolonged 2008 ice storm of central and sonthem China caused extensive damage to the electrical installations and railway contact wires. As a result, the transmission provider of the state has deployed substantial efforts to mitigate the effects of future ice storms. This paper describes the development of a knowledge-based decision support system for icing prediction and melting control strategy. The knowledge acquisition process is conducted based on the experimental and theoretical research. The system can predict if icing presents in the current condition, and estimate the possible icing types based on the meteorological parameters such as air temperature, relative humidity, wind speed, which are obtained by corresponding sensors. When icing presents, then the system will make a melting decision using the heat generated by the currents flowing in the wires based on the melting algorithm. Simultaneously the ice scene is monitored for security by real-time videos. This system can he used in power transmission lines or railway contact wires.