A low-cost PC-oriented virtual environment for operator training

Virtual environment (VE) technologies have been shown to provide invaluable training in the performance of complex procedural tasks. Of paramount importance to the success of any VE is realism; entities must move and behave believably and approximate the complexity of the real world. Such real-world fidelity is accompanied by the challenge of making immersive training in virtual reality (VR) more widely available, at costs significantly less prohibitive. A solution is presented to recreate the VE on low-cost PCs, reducing the cost of the VR software itself, yet preserving real-time performance. This paper presents a low-cost, PC-based VR development system within the framework of ESOPE-VR, a VR operator training simulator (OTS) prototype for power-utility personnel. PC-ESOPE-VR aims to provide the same or improved functionality and performance as the original, with a 3-D visual interface, voice recognition and feedback, navigation and manipulation facilities, and expert system, multimedia and multi-user (distributed) support, yet address the practical demands raised above. The PC-based system is also compatible with the original; it can draw on existing ESOPE-VR power component libraries and support the automatic synthesis of a virtual power station environment from its single-line diagram representation. The approach used towards fulfilling all these issues is described, followed by key implementation results.