SPONSORS OF SERVICING OFFSHORE WINDFARMS REDUCING MAINTENANCE COSTS
High Voltage Partial Discharge (HVPD) are experts in the field of on-line partial discharge (OLPD) condition
monitoring.They supply onshore and offshore renewable customers in the UK and overseas with OLPD solutions for the condition monitoring of in-service high voltage (HV) cables, switchgear and transformers.
CASE STUDY
A recent PD test, monitoring and preventative cable repair project for a major offshore wind farm in the UK illustrated how the OLPD insulation condition monitoring can lead to significant maintenance and operation cost reductions.
TESTING AND DIAGNOSTICS Initial on-line PD testing to assess the insulation condition of two 33 kV export cables connecting the offshore wind farm to shore, indicated high PD activity levels in one of the cables. Additional diagnostic and cable mapping tests identified the source of PD activity at one of the land section cable joints. The wind farm operator decided to replace the unreliable joint during a planned maintenance outage and the cable was re-tested. The post repair PD measurement results were acceptable and the weak point (the ‘incipient fault’) in the cable’s HV insulation had been removed.
COST BENEFIT ANALYSIS
The total cost of this planned, preventative maintenance repair was around £10,000 whilst the estimated cost of a previous unplanned outage was £127,000. According to UK Government’s Department of Environmental and Climate Change (DECC), such cost reductions are essential to drive down the operational costs of offshore windfarms.
COST REDUCTION TARGET DECC have put a target of reducing the total cost of offshore wind generation by 25% from the present ‘typical’ lifecycle cost of £135/MWh (for a 500MW windfarm) to below £100/MWh by 2020. HVPD believe that these cost reductions will only be achievable through the application of condition monitoring technology such as the HVPD OLPD monitoring.
HVPD
www.hvpd.co.uk
www.windenergynetwork.co.uk
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