ABB is upgrading ageing control systems on several high-voltage direct current links (HVDC) in Europe, Africa and the United States, setting new records for rapid project completion and minimal transmission disturbance.
The 1970s and 1980s generations of high voltage direct current (HVDC) links are nearly 30 years old. And after almost three decades of round-the-clock operation, their analog control systems – although still in perfect working order – are in need of modernisation to prevent unforeseen outages from occurring.
Recently, ABB has been selected to replace the control systems of five HVDC links with its MACH 2 control and protection system to secure availability, add new functionality and ensure another 30 years or more of trouble-free performance.
Two upgrades in the USA – the CU and Square Butte HVDC links between North Dakota and Minnesota have already been completed and have set industry benchmarks for rapid project completion and minimal transmission disruption.
“An astonishing achievement made possible by ABB’s modular-based HVDC control system, MACH 2, together with the dedication and excellence of a joint workforce”, is how Great River Energy’s transmission engineering manager described the exceptionally short and uneventful installation and commissioning of the new control system.
As a result of these successes, ABB has been awarded three contracts within the past year to upgrade control systems at the Skagerrak 1&2 HVDC interconnector between Denmark and Norway, the Cahora Bassa HVDC link between Mozambique and South Africa, and the Blackwater back-to-back station in New Mexico which interconnects the Western and Texas power grids in the USA.
ABOUT MACH 2
MACH 2 is designed specifically for converters in power applications. It is the highest performance and most used control and protection system for HVDC and FACTS (flexible AC transmission systems) on the market, with more than 400 installations in operation worldwide.
Many compromises have been avoided and both drastic volume reductions and substantial performance improvement have been achieved. MACH 2 has gradually evolved from an unequalled installed base of HVDC control systems around the world. It is also used in conventional SVC, HVDC and SVC Light and a number of other applications. Integrated with the MACH 2 control and protection equipment is the Station Control and Monitoring (SCM) system. Work stations (PCs) are interconnected by a local area network. The distributed system for remote I/O, for control as well as for process interfacing with the SCM system, is built up by a field bus network.
The most important part of the control system, the converter firing control, is built around a host 1.3 GHz Pentium III dual-processor system and six high performance digital signal processors (SHARC). This gives an unequalled calculation capacity that is used to fine-tune the performance of the converter-firing control system during system disturbances.
By using high performance industrial computer components ABB can fully utilise the extremely fast developments in the field of micro processors so that the control and protection system are always designed to ensure the highest possible performance.