Due to its ability to deal with non-determinism and partial observability, represent goals as an immediate reward function and find optimal solutions, planning under uncertainty using factored Markov Decision Processes (FMDPs) has increased its importance and usage in power plants and power systems. In this paper, three different applications using this approach are described: (i) optimal dam management in hydroelectric power plants, (ii) inspection and surveillance in electric substations, and (iii) optimization of steam generation in a combined cycle power plant. For each case, the technique has demonstrated to find optimal action policies in uncertain settings, present good response and compilation times, deal with stochastic variables and be a good alternative to traditional control systems. The main contributions of this work are as follows, a methodology to approximate a decision model using machine learning techniques, and examples of how to specify and solve problems in the electric power domain in terms of a FMDP.

Making good operation decisions during abnormal power plant conditions represents in many cases the possibility to avoid a unit trip or having economical losses. This paper introduces AsistO, an intelligent assistant for the decision support based on decision theoretic planning techniques. It provides power plant operators with useful recommendations to (i) maintain a plant running under safe conditions, or (ii) deal with process transients when an unexpected event occurs. We present the formalism of Markov decision processes as the core of the intelligent assistant which uses a factored representation of plant states. We also show a very intutive algorithm to approximate decision models based on training data collected through random exploration routines in a simulated environment. We have tested our system in the steam generation system of a combined power plant to deal with load disturbances.