The era of Computer-Aided Design (CAD) and Computer-Aided Engineering (CAE) tools played an important historical role in supporting the preparation of the so-called “electrical design books” for Protection, Automation and Control Systems (PACS) projects in substations. With CAD, everything consisted of lines and shapes drawn with great flexibility on a PC to create digital drawings that described the project graphically.

Later, in the CAE era, entities or blocks became the foundation of computer drawings and began to include data. This made it possible, for example, to generate bills of materials and use cross-references to navigate between document pages. Figure 1 shows the evolution from CAD to CAE.

CAE can undoubtedly be viewed as a step taken by CAD toward database-oriented projects, completely removing ink-drafted sheets (Fig. 2) from the world of electrical design. Digital project drawings were now available and could be navigated on a computer screen, manipulated, and replicated using a keyboard and mouse. This was similar to digital geographic maps (Fig. 3, left), which allowed users to enter data about places they had traveled—temperature, climate, impressions, capitals, roads taken, and so on—as well as generate lists of the recorded travel data or send copies of the map to a family member to do the same.

The only advances greater than those brought by digital geographic maps were those introduced by GPS systems (Fig. 3, right). In these positioning systems, the user specifies a route, whether or not the destination is already known, and information is automatically populated in the travel database. Traffic alerts, road obstacles, changes in estimated arrival time, better routes to reduce travel time, and other features are also provided. An evolution similar to that from digital maps to GPS also occurred in substation PAC projects, moving the user experience from CAE tools to project Engineering Platforms (EPs).

In an EP tool for substation PAC projects, the focus is on information. Before any graphical element is drawn, the design engineer begins the project by populating the database—either by entering data directly or importing it from standard Excel spreadsheets, for example. In other words, parametric object modeling is the starting point of the project, bringing EPs closer to other tools used for Building Information Modeling (BIM) projects. Another notable aspect of EPs is that design is only one of the possible uses. With all information about the designed system embedded in the platform, EPs can support many other applications throughout the entire project life cycle, including O&M after the implemented system enters operation.

Engineering Base (EB) is a well-known and efficient Engineering Platform from the German company AUCOTEC, dedicated to PAC projects, including substations. Its features use data stored in databases through intelligent algorithms built into the platform or customized with VBA macros to provide, in addition to CAE functionality, design and O&M engineering experiences such as:

(a) Automatic sizing and routing of cables from switchyard equipment to control and relay rooms, using the civil designs of concrete trenches and electrical conduits as input;

(b) Storage of protection-relay parameters and settings within the electrical project itself, enabling EB to control the issue and versioning of settings without requiring third-party solutions;

(c) The ability to export graphical control and automation logic projects directly to the parameterization languages of several IED manufacturers, eliminating duplicated work between design and field personnel and thereby reducing the possibility of errors;

(d) Automatic creation of a standardized point list for the SCADA system, also avoiding duplicated work among the teams involved and reducing the possibility of data-entry or verification errors;

(e) Integration with ERP tools, such as SAP, allowing the Engineering Platform to participate in the company's inventory-automation system as early as the project stage and increasing the accuracy of procurement for command, control, protection, and signaling devices;

(f) Execution of projects in accordance with IEC 61850, including the ability to export the standard's XML-format files for upload to IEDs;

(g) Support for digital documentation in multiple file extensions—PDF, XLS, DOC, DWG, and others—enabling use of the georeferenced platform (GIS) to manage engineering-project documentation across LAN, WAN, or GAN environments.

(h) A native collaborative philosophy allowing multiple teams to work in parallel on the same project and within the same electrical design book, or, in an outsourced environment, enabling service providers to work remotely and have their modifications incorporated into the main project.

Other functionalities could be added to those listed to provide technical support for adopting EB as an alternative to conventional CAD and CAE tools, such as asset management, support for procurement and service bidding processes, and project access control and authentication. Many other customizations may also lead to new functionalities, considering the possibility of developing VBA macros.
Finally, it is worth highlighting the potential productivity gains in design engineering and O&M activities resulting from migrating from CAD and CAE tools to an engineering platform. ESC Engenharia encourages readers to research the tools presented here and conduct their own assessment, and remains available to provide a more detailed explanation, including applied examples from its portfolio of PAC projects.