ELECTRICAL ENGINEERING
switchboard, verifying it via our single line schematic diagrams, and physically identifying where every cable went to. If we couldn’t identify it, we had to isolate it. Much of the work was done out of hours on night shifts, and once the team and I identified each cable and verified it, we physically labelled it, so we knew at both ‘ends’ what the cable was feeding.” Some of the switches could serve a full department, such as Medical Physics, or an operating theatre. “For example, “Andy Fairless said, “we have a suite of maxillofacial operating theatres which a single cable might have fed, or one might be feeding a plant room incorporating HVAC units that in turn serve wards or other critical areas. Some of the cables go off into risers, which then supply power to wards and departments, and might impact two to three whole floors. We had to do a lot of verification and identification before starting – an area where Jake Marshall and Mark Collins made a major contribution.”
30 people involved in switching activities.”
I put it to Andy Fairless that it was testament to all the planning that this highly complex was completed smoothly. He said: “The original investigative work by DTA was used to great effect, CAD 21 was involved on site, and Kier’s Site manager, Peter Haste, provided fantastic help and input. Overall, it was a great team effort.”
The new Northern Powergrid HV switchboard, now installed at the RVI. The RVI site incoming supply.
Battery back-up UPS units He explained that no patient had to be moved as part of the work: “As part of our meetings with the Patient Flow managers, we had the end-users in place, including the Matrons and Sisters, as well as the Trust’s EBME team. We rolled out battery back-up UPS units, and took in extension leads. We also timed the shutdowns around bringing extra staff into the wards, phasing them around clinical needs and handovers, and factoring in the likelihood of the need for any manual intervention. With all the preparation, thankfully we didn’t have a single mishap.” The ‘old’ switchboard, Andy Fairless explained, was challenging to dismantle. He said: “Back in 1990, when the RVI was built, switchboards were built to last. While their modern counterparts are designed to come apart fairly easily, this old Durham switchboard must have been built in situ before the wards’ construction. We effectively had to take it apart nut by nut, panel by panel, and it came out in pieces, whereas a new modern switchboard would come out in sections. It took a lot of dismantling.” He added: “The electrical upgrade project has future-proofed the hospital for, I would say, 40 years. Nobody else should have to go back and replace the Leazes Wing switchboard. The project was the most complex I have ever worked on. The switchboard replacement means I can now look at other work we want to do in the Leazes Wing. For instance, we
34 Health Estate Journal August 2020
have a theatre refurbishment plan we can progress, and we can now start looking at installing medical IT and UPS systems. Currently, we have operating theatres without UPS and IPS systems. Alongside all the work on the Leazes Wing switchboard, of course, we were undertaking the transformer replacement.”
Actively involved
Most of the electrical upgrade, Andy Fairless explained, was undertaken by Geoffrey Robinson’s staff and Jake Marshall and Mark Collins. He said: “Jake and Mark were actively involved in doing the safety programmes, the isolation, the earthing diagrams, liaising with the staff and the users, and arranging for all the isolations to take place. They would also issue the permits to the contractors and the Geoffrey Robinson team.” Andy Fairless continued: “We installed the new Leazes Wing switchboards in the order 3, 2, then 1. After installing switchboard 3, we had to remove part of the old switchboard, to allow us to start installing switchboard 2. Once it was installed, we then had to transfer cablings from the old switchboard onto Switchboards 2 and 3, to allow us to remove the rest of the old switchboard, before finally bringing in Switchboard 1. We then had to transfer services back to Switchboard 1.
“Throughout the project,” he continued, “we scheduled the switching to take careful account of clinical activity. The Leazes Wing undertakes a lot of outpatient activity, so there we could do quite a lot of the switching work at night. On one particular day, we counted over
Transformer sizes increased As part of the project, the team increased all the transformer sizes. Andy Fairless explained “We, formerly, for instance, had 800 kVA transformers, which are now 1,000 kVA units in some areas, while in the Leazes Wing, as we increased the transformer sizes from 1,000 to 1,500 kVA, and have increased the total site electrical capacity from 7.5 MVA to 11 MVA, Northern Powergrid has agreed we can use all that capacity if we need to. Where we didn’t have N+1 availability on our previous electrical infrastructure, we now do, and have gained greater HV and LV site-wide resilience. We can now look at starting our backlog maintenance programme. In the next financial year, we will be looking to begin refurbishing theatres in the Leazes Wing, hopefully tackling two per year. The additional electrical capacity not only gives us the ability to do this, but also to build a new rooftop plant room incorporating air-handling units. We will also be looking to fit a new LV electrical section board into the plantroom, fed from the new switchboards in the Leazes Wing switchroom.”
Looking to the future
In addition to the work already described, Andy Fairless explained that the project team looked at the RVI site’s main HV ring cabling. He said: “Although we don’t know which of the new buildings envisaged will be built first, we have future-proofed the RVI’s electrical capacity and resilience; we have two robust high voltage rings on site – before the upgrade, both had limitations on electrical load. Having since increased the cable size on them, we now have no such limitations, and can increase the load on both. We know that if the New Specialist Hospital Building is built it will go on the closed ring, and the Cardio Block on the open ring. We thus have no capacity issues going forward. From start to finish, the project went smoothly, and we are now in a great place to be able to carry out capital planning works. The electrical upgrade has made a massive difference to us already.”
hej
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