Respond newsletter November 2015
Respond newsletter - November 2015
Our Low Carbon Networks (LCN) Fund project – ‘Respond’ – will deliver an intelligent approach to managing fault current – the instantaneous surge of energy which occurs under fault conditions. This is the second newsletter about the Respond project. We hope you find it of interest.
Technology
We have recently completed a productive workshop with our project partner Schneider to develop the Fault Level Assessment Tool and we have produced a functional description.
The Fault Level Assessment Tool will be installed in our control room and will provide near real time fault level assessment of our network every five minutes or when there is a topology change. It will use the configuration from our network management system and generation/demand data to conduct this assessment.
When fault level approaches or rises above our equipment fault level ratings, the tool will instruct one of three fault level mitigation techniques to “enable” or “disable” at certain sites. The three techniques to be trialled as part of Respond are Adaptive Protection, the IS-limiter and the Fault Current Limiting service.
The techniques will only be enabled at times when the fault level approaches or rises above equipment fault level ratings.
The Respond techniques - technical
Adaptive Protection – also known as sequential tripping. This technique re-sequences the operation of circuit breakers and will be retrofitted into existing substation equipment. We have now completed the 11kV design and have made good progress on the 33kV design.
IS-limiter – a current-limiting fuse which detects the rapid rise in current when a fault occurs and responds within 1/200th of a second to break the current. The IS-limiter is an existing technology used on private networks in the UK and extensively on public networks in Europe, USA and Australia as a fault current mitigation technique. The design work to trial two of the devices as part of the Respond project is in its final stages.
Site selection and trials
The two fault level mitigation technical solutions to be trialled in Respond will be deployed in our substations as follows:
- Adaptive Protection: Five installations on 11kV and 6.6kV high voltage (HV) substations and two installations on 33kV extra high voltage (EHV) substations; and
- IS-limiters at two HV substations and monitoring at an additional five substations.
We have now selected 14 primary trial sites, ensuring a representative sample covering a mix of substation ages, relay types, type of distribution ring main units on the HV networks and configuration of equipment. Our methodology for site selection also considered the known fault history and the likelihood of a fault level issue arising in the future. This approach will ensure the trial results are representative of the GB population and facilitate the take-up of learning from Respond.
Fault Current Limiting Service
Respond offers financial benefits to customers who are willing and able to provide a response to us in the form of our third technique, the Fault Current Limiting service (FCL service), using new technology which will be trialled as part of the project.
We are currently conducting an extensive customer engagement programme to determine the willingness and ability of customers across different industrial and commercial (I&C) sectors to provide managed FCL services.
To date we have completed two customer focus groups with ten I&C customers to develop our customer communications materials and our survey instrument. The findings will also help us determine the price point for the provision of FCL services and shape our customer contracts. The survey, led by our project partner Impact Research, will include distribution network customers from across GB as well as our own customers and will be completed by the end of January 2016. We have already recruited over 250 I&C demand and generation customers to take part and we are in discussion with United Utilities to sign up to an FCL service.
If you would like more information about the Respond survey and trial please visit the Get involved page of our website. To take part in our survey please register online.
If you are interested in providing a Fault Current Limiting service to Electricity North West, please contact us.
What's next?
Over the next few months we will be focusing on the following key activities:
- Completing our customer survey and publishing the findings
- Installation and commissioning of fault mitigation equipment
- Building, testing and commissioning the Fault Level Assessment Tool
- Briefing our operational teams on fault level mitigation management protocols
- Monitoring and analysis procedures for the project trials
- Drafting our new commercial contracts and testing them on a group of customers
- Starting our live trials
- Continuing to keep you informed on our progress.
Find out more
- To find out more about the Respond survey and trial visit the Get involved page of our website.
- You can find project information, presentations and videos about Respond on the Key documents page of our website.
- If you have a general enquiry about the Respond project: email us or phone us on 0800 195 4141.
- If you are interested in attending any of our seminars or knowledge sharing events please contact us.