IIT Kharagpur researchers devise decision support system (DCS) to help maximise LPG connections in BPL households

Researchers from IIT Kharagpur have devised decision support system (DCS) to help maximise LPG connections in BPL (below poverty line) households under Pradhan Mantri Ujjwala Yojana. It is a first of its kind for analysis of national level energy policy. This kind of DSS can be developed for various central and state level policies for various commodities like agricultural commodities, solar panels distributions and so on.

Decision support system (DSS)

It is computer programme that helps in making sound rational decisions using mathematical programming and operation research techniques. It can provide exact values of important parameters over prescribed policy time period, which in turn will help to take important measures to ascertain proper functioning (monitoring) of policy towards the desired goal. It uses mixed integer linear programming to mathematically formulate policy using input parameters, decision variables and their relationships. This mathematical model has found optimum number of total BPL connections required in region, number of dealerships that need to be commissioned in region over policy time frame. The sensitivity analysis with this mathematical model can easily change in decision variable with respect to change in a parameter. With this, it is easy to predict not only how the number of household connections that can be increased but also the critical region that contributes most in each zone of LPG distribution.

Month: Current Affairs - November, 2018