As shown in FIG. 32, the system can include a computer 3202, a display device 3214, a keyboard 3216, a pointing device 3218 (i.e., mouse), and a network connection 114 to a power analytics server 3268. The computer 3202 can include various hardware components (e.g., processor 3204, video adapter 3206, system memory 3220, network interface 3210, serial port interface 3212, etc.) that are communicatively linked together by a system bus 3208. The system memory 3220 can include read only memory (ROM) 3222 and random access memory (RAM) 3226. A basic input/output system (BIOS) 3224 is stored in ROM 3222. The BIOS 3224 can contain basic routines that help to transfer information between elements/subsystems within the computer 3202 during certain computer 3202 operations. A number of program modules, components and/or engines can be temporarily stored in the RAM 3226, such as an operating system 3228, a component control engine 3230, a power system topology modeling engine 3232, a component configuration engine 3236 and a component database 3234. In one embodiment, permanent storage for the program modules, components, and/or engines described above can be provided by one or more types of storage media interfaced to the computer 3202 including, but not limited to, a hard disk drive, an optical disk drive, magnetic disk drive, flash memory cards, etc. In another embodiment, permanent storage for the program modules, components, and/or engines can be provided by one or more distributed computing devices (e.g., application servers, database servers, etc.) that are communicatively connected to the computer 3202 via a network connection 114.
