Asset Management, Industry 4.0 and Maintenance in Electrical Energy Distribution

This article presents the effects of Industry 4.0 (I4.0) combined with Asset Management (AM) in improving the life cycle of complex systems in Electrical Energy Distribution (EED). The boom in smart networks leaves companies in this sector no choice but to move forward I4.0. The contribution of I4.0 to the progress of AM in maintenance in EED will therefore be demonstrated by a case study using simulation. The case study will concern the benefits of using Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI), the heart of smart grids, at Hydro-Quebec Distribution (HQD), the primary supply authority in Quebec. The HQD network includes 4.3 million clients, on a territory of approximately 250,000 km2 and 680,000 overhead transformers. The results are conclusive: the number of outages will drop by 7% annually and maintenance costs will fall by at least 5% per year.