Remote operation of 220/132kV Salakati Substation – A glimpse
Somiran Das
Introduction
Successful implementation of remote operation scheme at
Salakati Substation to remotely control from 400kV
Bongaigaon Control Room on August`2007 introduce
North Eastern Region to the new field of technology.
220/132kV Salakati Substation is the first unmanned
Substation in NER. The scheme is based on the concept of
centralised RTU architecture, which is installed at Salakati
and SCADA system at Bongaigaon. RTU is equipped with
digital and analogue inputs units and control outputs,
communicate serially through twisted pair cable with
Control Centre at 400kV Bongaiagaon Control Room on
IEC60870-5-101 protocol. At Bongaiagaon Control Centre
using SCADA PC, the operator can see the mimic of
existing Control panels and issue control command.
Background
The 220/132kV Salakati Substation is located at Harigaon
in the District: Kokrajhar, BTC, Assam. The substation is
around 220 Km from Guwahati and 30 Km from New
Bongaigaon Railway Station. Salakati Substation provides
the first inter-country connectivity with Bhutan through
132kV Salakati-Gelephu feeder. It also plays a vital role
for NER Grid due to its connectivity with Eastern Region
through 220kV Birpara # I & II feeders and 400kV
Bongaigaon Sub-Station through 315 MVA, 400/220kV
ICT. The Substation was commissioned in the year 1987.
It is in close proximity with 400kV Bongaigaon
Substation. The road distance between the two Substations
is approx. 3.0 Kms.
Salakati substation comprises of 9 Nos - 220kV bays, 4
Nos - 132kV Bays, 2 Nos - 220/132kV, 50MVA
Transformer.
The control room operation was manned by total 12
personnel (one JE, two Technicians per shift) round the
clock. The power system parameters viz., MW, MVAR,
voltage, current etc were recorded mannually by shift
personnel in every hour.
Glossary of Terms
RTU: Remote Terminal Unit
SCADA: Supervisory Control And Data Acquisition
GPS: Global Positioning System
IEC: International Electrotechnical Commission
ULDC: Unified Load Despatch Centre
WTI: Winding Temperature Indication
OLTC: On Load Tap Changer
Dy Manager-OS, RHQ-Shillong
Scheme brief
Under the scheme, following functions of Salakati Control
Room were monitored and controlled from 400kV
Bongaigaon Control Room.
Monitoring functions
• All power system parameters (such as Voltage,
Current, Frequency, MW, MVAR, Synchronization)
as available in Control panels
• WTI and OLTC tap position of Transformers.
• All trip/non-trip alarms available in the
annunciation window facia.
• Open/close status of all Circuit Breakers, Isolators
& Earth switches
• Healthiness of auxiliary system i.e DC sytem,
ACDB, Room temperature
Control functions
• Open/Close of Circuit Breakers
• Control of OLTC
• Synchrocheck before closing of Circuit Breakers
• Accept/Reset of alarms
The overall system architecture of Salakati Remote
operation scheme is shown in Figure # 1. The purpose of
providing each equipments are explained herein.
RTU
RTU is a microprocessor controlled electronic device
which intefaces the field devices/substation equipment to
SCADA system. It performed the initial processing of the
acquired data. New RTU installed at Salakati is equipped
with power supply module, CPU, digital & analogue
inputs and control outputs module.
The CT & CVT secondaries of each feeders/Bus, WTI &
tap position of transformers are connected using electrical
transducers to RTU as analogue inputs.
All alarms and status information are connected to RTU as
digital inputs via contact multiplying relays .
The control outputs of RTU are connected to Circuit
Breakers via heavy duty auxiliary relay contacts.
New RTU supplied under the scheme is integrated with
ULDC RTU to collect few analog datas.
RTU has four communication ports and support
interfaces viz., RS232, RS485, Ethernet.
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SCADA SYSTEM
NEW RTU
Hardware inputs from
C&R panels/ fields
Figure # 1: Overall system architecture
SCADA System
SCADA system comprises of HMI (Human Machine
Interface i.e. PC with dual monitor), communication card,
database and software, which is installed at Bongaigaon
Control Room. Data acquired by the RTU from substation
equipments is transmitted to SCADA system. SCADA
than complies and formats the data in such a way that a
control room operator using the HMI can make
supervisory decisions. It provides operator interface to
monitor & control the substation equipment through
displays & SLD. Mimic of existing control panels, SLD
showing substation equipment & analog data’s has been
provided to helps operator feel working in conventional
Control Room environment.
SCADA also provides automatic logging and generation
of hourly, monthly, yearly data’s as per user requirement.
Communication medium
The data from RTU is transferred to SCADA system
through twisted pair cable over IEC60870-5-101 protocol
in dual redundant mode using line drivers. Twisted pair
communication cable is laid underground between
Salakati & Bongaigaon. Communication Port 1 & 2 of
RTU is used for data transfer at 9600 bps.
Line driver
Line drivers are used for signal amplification as well as
conversion from RS232 to RS485 & vice versa as the
length of cable is 1500 meters. Line driver is provided in
the two ends of the cable.
Time synchronization
SCADA system is time synchronized by GPS based
receiver (PC interface card) which in turn synchronizes
the time of RTU.
Major equipment Type, Model & Make
RTU » Type: MiCOM C264 series, Make: AREVA
SCADA PC » Model: Dell 380 Precesion, Make: Dell
SCADA software » E-terra, Ver.: 3.40, M/s AREVA
ULDC RTU
GPS » PC interface card with antenna, Make: Hopf
Augmentation of C&R panels
The existing hand reset trip relays have been replaced by
the self/ electrically reset trip relays.
Maintenance
Role of maintenance team in remotely control substation
is very vital. For any exigencies, maintenance team has to
report immediately. The routine maintenance/AMP of
substation shall be carried out by the maintenance team as
done normally. Additionally, operation of Isolators,
recording of relay indications/fault locators, PLCC
counter, DG set operation shall have to be done by
maintenance team.
Execution
The contract for execution of Salakati remote operation
works was awarded to M/s AREVA T&D Systems India
Limited, Noida at the total value of Rs. 37,35,317.00.
Economic & Operational benefits
Economics play a major role in justifying remote operation
of existing substations. The saving from the 12 nos. shift
personnel’s engaged in the Control Room operation comes
out to Rs. 66,00000.00 (approx) in a year. So, the cost of
implementing the remote operation scheme shall be
recovered within a year.
Conclusion
There are ample advantages in implementing remote
operation system in existing substations. Apart from
saving in operational cost, other advantages includes
accurate & timely information of power system data`s,
sequence of events occurred with 1ms resolution,
automatic report generation as per requirement etc.