Transmission Lines
using
Condition Assessment
and
Introducing Myself
Wal (Walter) Marshall
38 years in the power transmission
industry
28 years with NZ National Grid company
Transpower.
10 years as head of Transmission Line
engineering section at Transpower.
10 years as Director and Principal
consultant with LineTech Consulting >
2
Presentation Overview
Part 1: Background: LineTech, New Zealand, Transpower
Part 2: Problems we face inc Line Diversity
Part 3: Condition assessment / condition coding
--------Part 4: Predictive modelling: The basic concepts
Part 5: Environment, and component life data
Part 6: Putting it all together
Part 7: Linetech Software: Some output examples
Part 8: Summary >
3
Part 1: Background
LineTech Consulting..
A bit about us and TLM
New Zealand
How does it compare with Norway/Iceland?
NZ Transmission
Grid
12,000 route km of lines
(17,000 cct km)
110 kV, 220kV, and
350kVDC lines.
24,000 lattice towers,
11,000 poles.
Average line asset age
approx 50 years.
350 kV HVDC
Transmission
Link incl 3
Submarine
cables
between
Islands
(1965)
General GridPainted
pictures
towers, reconductored,
reinsulated (twice).
10
Helicopters :
11
Geothermal areas =
Areas of extreme localised corrosion >
12
Line Diversity
Increasing condition diversity with age
Other issues
Poor records / asset knowledge
Loss of skills
13
14
15
16
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18
As lines age,
they develop ever growing
component condition diversity.
Here are some NZ examples:
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Geothermal
Corrosion:
10 yrs
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23
Environmental Diversity:
Inland, Cold, Low Rainfall, Low Corrosion.
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Environmental Diversity:
High Rainfall, Geothermal drift, High Corrosion
25
45
61
89
25
96
1 -10 Very severe coastal. Severe wind exposure. Totally replaced with new line 1981.
All new insulation, spacers and dampers fitted in 1990 and again 2006
10-25 Moderate coastal. Reinsulated, new spacers, dampers, 1990. 4 new towers various
ages, Some duplex, triplex and Quad sections of line. Now needs reconductoring.
25-45 Moderate Coastal. Several new towers various ages.
45-61 Moderate coastal: New deviation built 1990. New and 2nd hand towers.
New and 2nd-hand conductor. New insulation and dampers.
61-89 Moderately severe coastal: Approx half of towers replaced between 1980 and 1997.
Insulation, dampers and spacers replaced 1990. Now needs reconductoring.
89-96 Light Coastal: All original towers and conductor. New insulation, dampers and
spacers in 1990.
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27
Future Maintenance
Any line is only as reliable as the weakest
component.
The inevitable process of increasing
diversity, is a threat to our ability to keep
lines maintained properly in the future.
Maintenance planning processes therefore
MUST be able to manage extreme
diversity. >
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32
rather than
CONDITION
DATA
Secure Asset
Valuation
Manpower
Planning
System
Planning
34
Long-term Work
Load (Predictive
trending)
Purchase and
Warehousing
Planning
37
Field 100
Condition
Code 80
%
>>
>>
Halfway through
service life
60
Se
rvi
c
el
ife
>>
>>
40
Replacement Criteria
20
10
0
0
38
Tr
Imminent
Failure
Hardware reliability
Crude interface and programming
User resistance, but
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Tower steel
Top usually
worse than bottom
Zinc thickness
measurement
problematic
Corrosion layers
vary with climate
Visual inspection
mostly used
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Tower Foundations
Grillages
Sample excavations
Corrosion current testing tried, and discarded to
unreliable.
Concrete
Base-plates Visual + chip out mortar on samples
Stub-legs - Visual
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43
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Grillage Foundations
Ages from 30 years to
over 80 years
Worst corrosion usually
at ground level
Sample excavations to
establish condition
45
Insulation: Ceramic
50% Porcelain, 50% glass
Visual inspection
Replacement driven mainly
by fitting corrosion.
Very little problems with
porcelain punctures or
cracking. >
48
Insulation: Composite
Mostly Silicone Rubber
Visual inspection only.
Multiple potential failure modes.
(Some visible, some are not).
Spray droplet test also used for
hydrophobicity to check shed aging
No serious problems encountered
to date, but ..
All first generation units have been
removed.
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Insulator Fittings
1.
2.
3.
50
Conductor
Copper
Visual + Samples removed for testing for annealing
ACSR AC (Greased)
Very long life even in extreme environments
Only vibration damage found.
ACSR Corrosion
Lots of problems and 1000s of km of conductor
replaced.
Average life to replacement in coastal areas only
20-25 yrs
Note: All new and replacement conductor is ACSR AC
(Greased.) >
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Cormon Corrosion
Tester
Used to find grease
holidays
Used on older ACSR
to confirm sampling
results. >
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Dampers
Fatigue Crack
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Joints
Multiple joint deterioration
processes.
Internal corrosion, thermal
cycling, ice jacking etc
Resistance measurements
used. Good results.
Resistances measured live.
Random sampling + every joint
on highly loaded circuits.
Thermal imaging not used
much. (End of life detection only)
Problems encountered >
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60
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Easy...????........NOT!
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Basic Concepts
If we know what we have now, and
We know what condition its in now, and
We know how it ages
And what it costs to repair..
then a computer programme can -
Big Picture
PREDICTIVE REPORTING
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6. COST DATA
System wide
Fixed.
5. DECISION TREES
System wide
Fixed.
Fixed.
3. ENVIRONMENT DATA
Per Line
Fixed.
2. CONDITION DATA
Per Line
Live.
1. ASSET DATA
Per Line
Fixed.
Output Information
Maintenance can be predicted as far into
the future as you want. (e.g. 50 yrs!)
Cost detailed by year, line, tower and
component.
Costs broken by labour and materials.
An effective remaining engineering life
for each line asset.
An engineering valuation based on
overall line condition.
And more. >
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What Value.?
All output is based on set criteria that can be
audited
Whole network evaluated on a single set of
assumptions that can be easily changed if
required.
All opinions and input data are visible
Future materials and manpower resourcing trends
become visible
Powerful what if tool. (e.g. this route or that)
Entire network can summated into a single page.
>
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Rainfall :
Towers, wood poles and arms,
Wind run :
Suspension hot and cold ends, dampers.
Soil resistivity/acidity :
Grillage foundations >
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Defining Environments
Precision not necessary, or possible !
Environments change from year to year
(more so recently - global warming?)
Even at a single tower site environment
will change with tower height .
Reasonable to define general
environment from tower site to tower site
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Corrosion
Maps
Useful as a
general guide
only
Individual
tower sites
can vary
greatly.
Adjacient
sites can be
markedly
different >
74
Rainfall
Maps
Some
correlation
with
corrosion
maps
Useful to
know the
likely
number of
wet/dry
cycles.
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Y e a r s to g a lv a n is in g
fa ilu r e
(F r o m 6 0 0 g m s /m 2 )
100
Z in c lo s s r a te s
per year
(g m s /m 2 /y r )
6
E n v ir o n m e n t
C ode
80
7 .5
0 .8
60
10
0 .6
40
15
0 .4
20
30
0 .2
10
60
0 .1
120
0 .0 5
1 .0
80
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AGE (YRS) AT
REPLACEMENT
CRITERIA
Severe
Moderate
Benign
Environment Code %
10
20
30
40
50
60
70
80
90
100
10
15
20
28
38
50
65
80
100
120
Insulator :
Glass/porcelain
12
15
20
26
33
40
50
60
70
45
14
18
23
30
35
45
55
65
75
ACSR GZ Ungreased
12
15
20
25
30
35
40
50
60
ACSR GZ Greased
10
12
15
20
25
32
40
50
60
75
88
ACSR AC Greased
25
30
35
40
50
65
80
99
130
160
220
10
15
20
27
37
50
65
80
100
82
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Replacement tables
When an item needs replacing or maintaining,
we define what happens in a table
Original Item
84
at
Replacement Item
Damper
20%
Damper
30%
Composite Insulator
Wooden Crossarm
30%
Wood Pole
25%
Concrete Pole
ACSR GZ Conductor
30%
ACSR AC Conductor
GZ Earthwire
40%
OPGW
Decision Trees
Decision trees set correct maintenance actions:
Example below is for tower painting
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Maintenance Costs
Costs are defined in a table for all
maintenance actions; replacement and
maintenance
Costs are allocated against each item as
Labour (Lineman hours + Engineering hours)
Materials (Imported from stock system)
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2.
3.
Environment data
4.
5.
Replacement tables.
6.
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Central database
to hold all lines
related data:
(Asset data &
Condition data.)
Software to
build
management
reports
Environment
coding
from each
structure
site
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Modeling data
Main
database
Line and
Structure
Asset data
Component
condition
data
Frozen data
Snapshot
containing
all required
modeling
data
Tables of
Standard
components
and costs
Structure
environment
codes
Data
Record
Archived
Defined output
parameters: e.g. time
span to be modeled,
components covered,
report format etc.
LINE
MODEL
SOFTWARE
Table of standard
replacement
components, and
costing data
Table of component
lives in each defined
environment
Output
File or
report
100
90
80
70
60
%
50
Worn 40
30
20
10
Failure 0
94
% Remaining
life.
1 3 5 7 9 11 13 15 17 18 20 22 24 26 28 30
Tower Number
95
E a r t h w ir e
S p a c e rs
D a m p e rs
80
C o n d u c to r
60
H a rd w a re
In s u la tio n
40
F o u n d a tio n s
20
T o w ers
0
100%
70%
40%
Component Condition
96
10%
T o w e rs
F o u n d a tio n s
In s u la t io n
H a rd w a re
C o n d u c to r
D a m p e rs
S p a c e rs
E a r t h w ir e
97
98
Cumulative Cost
3000
Route 1
Coastal
2500
2000
1500
Route 2
Inland
1000
500
0
5
30
55
Years
99
80
105
100
Presentation Summary
As lines age they will not only deteriorate but become
increasingly diverse in condition and construction.
The task of managing maintenance will become
evermore more complex.
Maintenance bust be able to manage diversity
Detailed condition assessment data is essential to enable
sound forward planning in diverse systems without loss
of reliability.
A computerised line model can give you