Hotline of power engineering specialists:
IDGC of Centre — Belgorodenergo division continues to implement the project on digital weather stations in 14 districts of the Belgorod region. These devices are designed to signal changes of different weather conditions and, ultimately, allow time to prepare for the prevention of failures at power facilities.
Earlier for this purpose the branch used temperature sensors. The first weather station was installed in April last year in Novooskolsky district and integrated with the SCADA system, enabling real-time control of grid operation and management.
The functionality o the automatic weather station includes continuous measurement of atmospheric pressure, relative humidity and air temperature, wind speed and direction with special sensors. Data is transmitted to the Grid Control Center (GCC) and the supervisory control centers in Districts of Electrical Networks of Belgorodenergo. Communication can be done over wired and wireless lines through radio modem, as well as via mobile phone through GPRS-modem.
On the basis of weather data power engineers plan their activities, taking into account the direction of a cyclone, possible precipitation, wind power and more. For example, at low temperature and high humidity the likelihood of wire breaking increases due to power line icing. The same happens at squally wind. At air temperatures below minus 20 any planned outages are forbidden, a special operation mode of electrical installations is introduced. This allows quickly to take necessary measures and to minimize the impact. All data obtained from weather stations are recorded and archived on the server.
As Deputy Chief of operations and technology Service of IDGC of Centre — Belgorodenergo division Yaroslav Yurikov noted, the work is currently under way to choose places for the installation of weather stations. Location of weather stations should comply with the natural landscape so that resulting data will be correct and will not be influenced by various manmade and natural factors. In the second stage systems will be installed on a pole and with a cable connected to data receivers, which transmit data to the operator’s monitor.
“This year, the branch plans to install other 14 weather stations — says Yaroslav Yurikov. — After this we will have information about weather conditions throughout the region. In addition, in the future we want to integrate data from our weather stations with data of stations in neighboring regions. The goal is simple: if, say, in the Voronezh region a snowfall begins, we learn about it instantly, check the wind direction and are able to predict whether it will come to our region. Thus, power engineers will be somewhat insured from weather surprises and will be prepared for them beforehand”.