Wednesday, July 29, 2009

Remote 2009 Conference & Expo, October 29-30, 2009 - San Antonio (TX)

The Remote 2009 Conference and Expo will focus on the leading advancements for the monitoring and management of distributed equipment and facilities, remote assets, automated process & system controls and device networks. Large-scale users and industry experts will speak on SCADA, remote networking technology, security (cyber and physical), control, automation, onsite and back-up power, M2M, emerging wireless technology, telemetry and condition monitoring.

IEC 61850 will be discussed in a paper from Prosoft Technology, Inc. Click HERE for the conference program.

There will also be a 2 day workshop on IEC 61850, IEC 61400-25, DNP3 ... crucial building blocks also for smart grids. Click HERE for the program of the workshop.

Tuesday, July 28, 2009

IEEE 1588 - Precision Clock Synchronization realized in Hirschmann Ethernet Switches

Hirschmann (Neckartenzlingen, Germany - a leader in Industrial Ethernet) claims to be one of first vendors that has implemented IEEE 1588 Precision Clock Synchronization.

Accurate time information is crucial for distributed automation systems in factories and power systems. The Precision Time Protocol (PTP) defined in IEEE 1588, supports synchronization of distributed clocks with an accuracy of less than 1 microsecond in an Ethernet networks.

Click HERE [pdf, 800KB, 20 pages] for a very helpful White Paper from Hirschmann that explains the synchronization basics ... in case you want to understand how IEEE 1588 functions.

The definition of a specific profile for power system (IEC 61850, especially IEC 61850-9-2) is currently under discussion and is expected to be available by end of 2009.

Click HERE [pdf] for a nice presentation by SEL (January 2008)

Click HERE [pdf] for a further reading on Why do we need time in Power Systems?

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

U.S. 2010 Energy and Water Appropriations: some $27 billion

According to a recent press release of the U.S. Committee on Appropriations the U.S. Department of Energy will have some $27 billion funding for 2010: "The Energy and Water Appropriations Bill is a key part of ongoing efforts to meet the infrastructure needs of the country and, after years of neglect, addressing the inadequacies of our national energy policies. This bill invests in new technologies, scientific research, and conservation efforts that will provide long term solutions to our energy needs and create jobs. ... And it continues to invest in the development of a new “smart grid” to ensure electricity delivery and energy reliability."

Excerpt of the Summary:

Total funding: DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY = $26.9 billion !!

- Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy: $2.25 billion

- Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability : $208 million:

  • Smart Grid Technologies: $62.9 million, $30 million above 2009, for smart grid research and
    development.
  • Energy Storage: $15 million, more than triple 2009, for research and development of grid-connected
    energy storage technologies.
  • Cyber Security: $46.5 million for energy delivery cyber security, an increase of $34.5 million from
    2009, to develop secure grid technologies as cyber attacks increase worldwide and the grid becomes
    increasingly network-connected.
  • Clean Energy Transmission and Reliability: $42 million to increase the efficiency of the grid and
    enable the widespread deployment of clean, domestic renewable energy.

- ...

Click HERE for the complete official Summary.

What is your Government providing? The German Government funds many projects. E.g., the E-Energy projects ... project budgets of some € 140 million for a 4-year term ... some € 35 million per year.

Click HERE for executive information on the E-Energy projects.

Thursday, July 16, 2009

First German Offshore Wind Turbine - with IEC 61400-25

EWE, E.ON and Vattenfall have successfully completed the construction of the first wind turbine for the alpha ventus offshore wind farm in the North Sea ... using IEC 61400-25. The 5-megawatt turbine is located 45 kilometres north of the island of Borkum. A total of 12 turbines are scheduled to be in running by year's end.

Click HERE for more details on the offshore park (press release).

The communication with the turbines uses the new standard IEC 61400-25.

Click HERE for some details on the communication with IEC 61400-25 from a SCADA viewpoint.

Click HERE for a description of Beckhoff PLC supporting IEC 61400-25 for Wind Turbines in alpha ventus (GERMAN only).

Saturday, July 11, 2009

German contribution to Smart Grids: E-Energy Flyer in German, English and Japanese

Several German E-Energy projects focus on ICT-based energy system of the future Smart Grid ... by spending an overall budget of some € 140 million for a 4-year term.

Initiated by the German Federal Ministry of Economics and Technology (BMWi) and implemented in collaboration with the German Federal Environment Ministry (BMU) the projects will deal with problems of the current German power delivery system. "New integral system solutions are called for, in which information and communication technologies (ICTs) will play a key role.", according to a new 2 page flyer that is available in three languages:

Click HERE for the German version.
Click HERE for the English version.
Click HERE for the Japanese version.
A Chinese version will be available soon.

Click HERE for an example of the use of IEC 61850 and IEC 61400-25 in an E-Energy projects.

Click HERE for further presentations discussing Smart Grid issues an some IEC Standards supporting Interoperability of devices and systems ... the slides were provided and discussed during the IEC TC 57 WG 17 DER Workshop in Fredericia (Denmark, 2008-02) and HERE for presentations of the Workshop in Oldenburg (Germany, 2007-06).

EPRI Input to U.S. Smart Grid Roadmap open for Comments

The next crucial step towards the U.S. Smart grid Roadmap is the public review and commenting of the EPRI "Report to NIST on the Smart Grid Interoperability Standards Roadmap".

The commenting phase is open until July 30, 2009.

Click HERE for more details on how to comment.

The federal Register Notice announced the availability of the report on June 30.

Click HERE for the federal announcement.

The "Report to NIST on the Smart Grid Interoperability Standards Roadmap (Contract No. SB1341-09-CN-0031—Deliverable 7) prepared by the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), June 17, 2009, is available at: www.nist.gov/smartgrid/

I hope that many experts reading this news blog will provide comments on the Report to NIST.

I will provide comments taking my experience in interoperability issues into account.

Click HERE to see my experience profile. If you have any comments you want to share with me, please send a copy of your comments to schwarz@scc-online.de

Thursday, July 9, 2009

IEC 61850 - Hands-On Training in Sao Paulo (Brazil) on 19-21 August 2009

The details of the program for the planned NettedAutomation/STRI - vendor independent!! - Hands-On Training on IEC 61850 to be held in Sao Paulo (Brazil) on 19-21 August 2009 are available.

Click HERE to download the program and registration information for the Sao Paulo event [pdf, 650 KB].

Click HERE to see the list of upcoming Training opportunities.

Wednesday, July 8, 2009

ENTSO-E: European Network of Transmission System Operators for Electricity

 

The organizations ATSOI, BALTSO, ETSO, NORDEL, UCTE and UKTSOA have been fully integrated into ENTSO-E since July 2009. The ENTSO-E is now fully operational.

The objectives of the new organization is: "Promote the reliable operation, optimal management and sound technical evolution of the European electricity transmission system in order to ensure security of supply and to meet the needs of the Internal Energy Market."

42 TSOs from 34 countries are members in the ENTSO-E.

ENTSO-E – EC Workshop on “Critical Infrastructure Protection” for Transmission Grid

The workshop on Critical Infrastructure Protection (CIP) for electricity transmission networks was held on 15/16 June 2009 in Cologne, Germany. ENTSO-E and the European Commission jointly organized the workshop. This workshop was an important platform for experts of European TSOs and other organizations involved in security issues.

Click HERE [pdf] to download the agenda and HERE to download the presentations [zip].

CIM Users Group met at UCTE (ENTSO-E)

The CIM Users Group presented and discussed recently in Brussels (Belgium) the current status of IEC 61968 (CIM - Common Information Model) and the application in Europe.

The ENTSO-E reported: "About 70 experts from more than 40 companies worldwide attended the meeting, partly focused on the UCTE CIM profile. UCTE's migration policy towards CIM standards for exchange of operational and planning data is expected to lead to wide-spread adoption of the CIM standard for many additional applications in Europe."

Click HERE to access the presentations of the event.

Wednesday, July 1, 2009

IEC 61850 - Hands-On Trainings in Buenos Aires and Sao Paulo

Dear expert interested in the standard IEC 61850 for Substations and other Power Automation Systems,

NettedAutomation GmbH (Germany) and STRI (Sweden) are proud to announce possibility for two 3-day Hands-On Training sessions in Buenos Aires (12-14 August 2009) and Sao Paulo (19-21 August 2009).

This training has the objective to provide both theory and practice on the application of IEC 61850 in a substation or a smart grid. We cover the planning, design and engineering process for real applications all the way to configuration and testing based on a real multivendor test installation. The 3 day course consists of:

Module 1 gives a level 1 introduction to the IEC 61850 standard together with a summary with real applications and the demonstration of STRI facilities for multivendor interoperability testing.

Module 2 gives an independent and more detailed update on the IEC 61850 standard for substation and device modelling as well as communication principles with real examples.

Module 3 provides a IEC 61850 hands-on workshop demonstrating interoperability of protection and control devices from ABB and Siemens as well as testing techniques communicating over a substation Ethernet network.

The program will be similar to the Training session scheduled for Frankfurt (Germany) on October 20-23, 2009 - mainly the Modules 1, 2, and 4a (of the Frankfurt event) will be used for the events in Buenos Aires and Sao Paulo:

Program and registration for the Frankfurt event [pdf]

The training is subject to minimum number of some 10 attendees. As we are traveling to South America for other events, we can offer these training sessions for a high discounted price of EURO 930 per person plus tax.

Please let us know by July 13, 2009 if you are interested to attend. Your feedback is essential in order to run the events.

We are confident, that our experience and service would meet all your expectations! You’d get first-hand, very comprehensive, vendor neutral and up-to-date knowledge, experience, and guidance.

Our experience profile can be found here:
http://nettedautomation.com/download/Netted-Schwarz-Profile-en_2009-01-21.pdf

http://www.stri.se/iec61850

We look forward to greeting you at one of our next training events.

If you are interested in a special in-house training for you and your people, please contact us.

Please feel free to forward this email to any colleagues who you think might be interested in one of the events.

Best Regards,

Karlheinz Schwarz
NettedAutomation GmbH
Im Eichbaeumle 108
76139 Karlsruhe
Germany

Phone +49-721-684844
Fax   +49-721-679387
karlheinz.schwarz@nettedautomation.com
http://www.nettedautomation.com

Nicholas Etherden
STRI AB
Box 707
SE-771 80 Ludvika, Sweden

Phone  +46 (0)240 795 02
Mobile +46 (0)70-6179562
Fax    +46 (0)240 807 66
nicholas.etherden@stri.se
http://stri.se