Towards a State Explanation Framework in Cyber-Physical Systems

The concept of Explainable Cyber-Physical Systems (ExpCPSs) aims to provide clear explanations for system decisions and actions, which is crucial for understanding, managing, and controlling high-risk Cyber-Physical Systems (CPSs), such as intelligent energy distribution networks or Smart Grids (SGs). Existing approaches for ExpCPSs, however, are typically designed only for specific application areas, limiting their impact. This paper proposes a domain-independent framework for automatically generating system state explanations in a CPS through (i) a unified data model and (ii) novel explanation algorithms to improve systems transparency, interpretability, and trustworthiness. The proposed framework facilitates root cause analysis on CPSs independently of their domains, enabling users to query system states and receive comprehensive explanations. We evaluated our solution in a real-world Electric Vehicle (EV) charging garage use case, highlighting its feasibility and effectiveness.