At the old control room I saw at a glance, when entering the room, what the state of the plant is

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1 SAFIR2010 Interim Seminar 2009

7.3.2009

Jari Laarni, Leena Norros, Leena Salo, Hanna Koskinen Paula Savioja, Iina Aaltonen, Marja Liinasuo

Human Activity and Systems Usability Team

With special thanks to

Ville Nurmilaukas, Fortum

Alf-Ove Braseth, IFE

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Outline of the presentation

•Digitalization of HSIs

•Large screen displays in nuclear power plant control rooms

•Designing large screen displays for NPP CRs

•Presentation of information on LSDs: Evaluation of the Fortum IRD pilot

•Affordance-based design of NPP control rooms

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Digitalization of HSIs

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History and future of HSIs in nuclear field

CONVENTIONAL ANALOGUE SMART

DESKTOP-BASED

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CLAIM

In addition to interface management tasks, also operators' primary tasks may be affected

-> Concept of Operations will change

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Prospects of digitalized, desktop-based CR

•All task-related information can be easily integrated

•Information can be tailored to the needs of the operators

•Decision support logic can be developed to help decision making

•User interfaces can be accessed where ever they are needed

•Some tasks can be automated to reduce workload

(O'Hara et al., 2003; Salo et al., in press)

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Challenges of digitalized, desktop-based CR

• Increased separation from the process

• Reduced team situation awareness, inhibition of communication, reduction of collaboration

• Reduced tactile feedback

• Keyhole effect

• Increase of secondary task demands

Earlier you saw from the operator's position in the room

what he was doing…

At the old control room I saw at a glance, when entering the room, what the state of

the plant is. Now, at the digital control room

it is impossible…

You easily click with the mouse the wrong valve icon…

It is difficult to operate the valves with these

buttons…

(O'Hara et al., 2003; Salo et al., in press)

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Drawback: reduced situation awareness

WHAT DOES IT

MEAN?

WHAT CAN I DO ABOUT IT?

WHAT WILL HAPPEN

NEXT?

WHAT IS GOING

ON?

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Drawback: reduced team situation awareness

WHAT DO WE KNOW?

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SOLUTION TO THE PROBLEM:

Provide overview information

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OVERVIEW = General description, outline of something

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Solution: large screen overview display

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Large screen displays in nuclear power plant control rooms

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Definition

•LSDs are large-scale, wide-angle, projected or tiled displays

providing users shared visual information on the status of the

system

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”… when a display exceeds a certain size, it becomes qualitatively different.”

(Swaminathan & Sato, 1997)

"Do not think a large display as merely a large desktop

monitor, instead focus on the properties of the entire space."

(Khan ym., 2005)

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Classification of LSDs

•Display quality

•Medium and high quality 2-D displays

•3-D displays

•Display location

•Distant-contiguous displays

•Desktop-contiguous displays

•Peripheral displays

•Interaction type

•Displays aimed only for viewing purposes

•Interactive displays

•Integrated systems

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Application areas

•Apply well to the following purposes

•It is difficult to get an overview of the state of system

•Presentation of information for groups of users

•Users have to move and view the display from different parts of the room

•Several users have to get access to a particular piece of information at the same time

•Users have to coordinate their actions and/or to work together

Apply well to digital NPP CRs

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Usage practices based on earlier studies

•One display is chosen for a main display

•Often the nearest display or the display at the centre is chosen for this

•Part of the screen area is not viewed

•Typically, this area is at the top of the screen -> Efficiency of LSDs is quite poor

•Fluent usage of LSDs requires learning

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Benefits of LSDs

•Image covers a larger part of the retina

-> Provides a common reference point -> Supports co-operation

•In principle, more information can be presented

-> State of the process can be outlined with a single glance -> Helps users to be aware of where they are in an information

space

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Challenges

•General

•Efficiency is poor

•LSD system design is demanding

•Technical problems

•Image may be distorted for many reasons

•Usability problems

•Difficult to arrange them optimally

•Common use of desktop screens and LSDs is challenging

•Problems in finding information from the LSD

•Management of windows may be difficult

•Fluent usage of interactive displays is demanding

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Designing large screen displays for NPP CRs

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Main themes

•Role of large-screen displays (why large screen?)

•Control room layout

•Information content in different plant states (what is presented?)

•Properties of the user interface (how is presented?)

•Usage practices of large-screen displays

•Content managament of large-screen displays

Generate a design solution for the use of large-screen displays in the main control room (layout of the control room, arrangement of workstations in the control room)

Generate a design solution for the information content of large-screen displays and the way the information is presented on them (graphical presentation of

large-screen displays in the main control room)

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Design workshops: Results - Layout

•Innovative new design solutions were generated

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Design workshops results: Requirements for LSDs

• Ideal LSDs should be some kind of synthesis of panels and process computer displays

• LSDs should serve all the operators in all the possible plant states

• But LSDs have a different function for different operators

• Different information systems should discuss with each other

• LSDs should provide all the essential information operators need

• Operators should have an opportunity to manage their own set of LSDs if needed

• Some of the large screens should have a fixed content

• Content of the main screens should be automatically updated

• For each plant state there should be large screens that are dedicated to this particular plant state

• LSDs should help operators to assess what other operators are doing

• Operating windows should be displayed on the LSD when the operator is operating a particular device

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General framework for the LSD concept

•Main functions of the LSD in the CR

1) Provide an overview of the state of the power process 2) Support situation awareness

3) Provide support for the rapid detection of failures and stabilization of the process

4) Support operators' co-operation, collaboration and coordination of activities

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Outline of the LSD concept

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LSD concept: Usage practices

•Major factors affecting the usage practices of LSDs

•Division of responsibility

•Interactivity

•Integrability

•Co-operativity

Division of Responsibility

centralized decentralized

Interactivity

interactive non-interactive

manual automatic

Integrability

part of a whole

Co-operativity

one user group of users

transparent non-transparent

independent

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LSD concept: Information Content

•Major factors affecting the information content of LSDs

• Level of abstractness

• Extent of description

• Level of structuralness

• Level of dynamicism

• Extent of target group

• Level of customization

• Uniformity

Level of Abstractness

detailed abstract

Extent of Description

selectively comprehensively

Level of Structuralness

structural non-structural

Level of Dynamicism

dynamic static

Extent of Target Group

one user group of users

Level of Customization

copied customized

Uniformity

uniform non-uniform

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Intermediate conclusions

•LSDs have four key functions at the NPP CR

•LSD concept should answer to two types of questions:

1) By which way LSDs are used in different plant states 2) How information is presented on the large screen display

•Role, usage practices and content of large screens depend on the state of the plan

•Responsibility of the management of LSDs should be shared

•LSDs should be well integrated with other information systems of the plant

•There were different views of the preferable abstraction level of information on LSDs

•Content of large screens should be carefully designed and

customized to support operators’specific needs and requirements

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Presentation of information on LSDs:

Evaluation of the Fortum IRD pilot

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Aim of the development of Fortum IRD pilot

•Aim is to design displays that

•Provide overview information

•Support early detection of failures and disturbances

•Help to diagnose problems and stabilize the process

(Laarni et al., Proceedings of NPIC&HMIT 2009, in press; Braseth et al., Proceedings of NPIC&HMIT2009, in press)

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Key design features (1)

•Display normalization

•"Information richness"

Normalized trends:

Normalized trend including information of valve position:

Unnormalized trends:

(Braseth, 2008)

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Key design features (2)

•Dull screen principle

Saturated colours used: Low-saturated colours used:

(Braseth & Nurmilaukas, 2008)

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Development of Fortum IRD pilot

•Stages of the development process

1) Determination of goals

2) Kick off

3) Rapid prototyping based on several workshops

4) Specification of the design 5) Evaluation of the prototype

system

• Observations

• Interviews

• Usability test

(Braseth & Nurmilaukas, 2008)

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Results of the evaluation: operator performance

0 5 10 15

Scenario A Scenario B

Scenario

Failure Detection Time (sec)

IRD Loviisa

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70

LSD PMS Operator Other

Percentage of Time

IRD Loviisa

Failure detection time: Percentage of time looking at different info sources:

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Results of the evaluation: operators' comments

•Overall, the IRD displays were well received

•They are helpful in the detection of initial events

•Trends and graphs aggregate information in useful formats

•They help operators to maintain accurate situation awareness

•They can improve collaboration and co-operation

•But

•Value of key IRD-design features was somewhat questioned

•Their content should change according to the plant state

•They could be more interactive

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Lessons learned

•Displays based on new design concepts are useful in visualising and highlighting certain aspects of the data

•BUT: they may obscure other essential data

•Agile design approach (ie rapid prototyping) worked well

•BUT: perhaps more systematic approach is needed for the development of HSIs for safety-critical systems

Large-screen displays should not be designed separately

without taking their interaction with other HSI elements

and system level dynamics into account

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Affordance-based design of NPP control rooms

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Functional Abstraction network:

Modelling Critical domain relationships

Cognitive Work Requirements:

Identifying the Cognitive Demands of the Problem Space

Information/Relationship Requirements:Defining What Content is Needed for Effective Decision-Making

Representation Design Requirements:Defining

Relationships Between Requirements and Visualization Concept

Presentation Design Concepts:

Making the Problem Transparent

Affordances in

Abstraction Hierarchy:

machine interaction cycle:

Affordances between technical functions and users' tasks:

(Elm et al., 2003; Koskinen et al., 2007)

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Towards an affordance-based CR

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History and future of HSIs in nuclear field

CONVENTIONAL ANALOGUE SMART

DESKTOP-BASED

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7.3.2009