ONE of NOJA Power's electrical sales engineers, Martin van der Linde, presented at the Australian Protection Symposium (APS), about increasing the return on network assets.
Now in its ninth year, the APS is seen as Australia’s premier electricity network protection gathering. The event attracts those involved in the electrical transmission and distribution industry, especially in protection.
The 2015 APS took place during mid-August at the Powerhouse Museum, Darling Harbour, Sydney, and comprised a series of 20-minute presentations from experts from Australia and around the globe.
The event also included a panel discussion and a Q&A session. All presented papers were then made available in the APS proceedings.
Mr van der Linde's presentation provided insight into Automatic Circuit Reclosers’ extensive capabilities and explains how implementation of additional functionality can increase the return on network assets
The presentation set out to demonstrate that implementing the additional functionality of an ACR such as NOJA Power’s OSM series does not require large engineering resource or the development of complex algorithms.
The presentation included two examples of how an ACR's functionality can improve value from distribution automation and protection assets.
Firstly, adapting an ACR’s reclose sequence can help mitigate bushfires in the high-risk season. In normal use, an ACR recloses four times to lockout in order to clear a fault while minimising customer disruption. But such a sequence increases the risk of ignition at the site of the fault during high bushfire risk periods. System controllers can easily and remotely limit the reclose sequence to just two operations before lockout––decreasing the ignition risk––without having to manipulate ACR settings.
Secondly, new developments in functionality now enable comprehensive power quality monitoring. NOJA Power’s OSM series ACRs, for example, can now measure harmonic distortion, interruptions, and sags and swells, helping to prevent power contamination damaging assets and interrupting the supply.
According to NOJA Power, one of the biggest obstacles to engineers fully exploiting the capabilities of their network assets is the apparent complexities of implementing schemes beyond simple protection. With modern day software, however, it is now straightforward to access the wide range of functionality that modern ACRs offer, allowing utilities to get more from their assets.
NOJA Power’s presentation from the APC conference, entitled “The Reality of Providing Energy in Australia: Bushfire Mitigation and the Benefits of Power Quality Monitoring Outside Substations,” details how the additional functionality of its ACRs can be easily implemented. The white paper is available from the company’s website.