How IoT and digital solutions for HV substation maintenance programs minimize risk and increase uptime.
Arena 1
One of the most significant costs of operating a generation facility isn’t maintenance or spare parts—it’s lost revenue from downtime when the facility isn’t generating electricity. The cost of downtime from an HV Substation/grid connection can reach hundreds of thousands of dollars per day, quickly escalating into millions and jeopardizing the profitability of the operation.
Traditionally, equipment has been maintained at predefined intervals to reduce the risk of unexpected failures. However, with sensors now embedded in nearly every component, it’s time to move beyond time-based maintenance and adopt risk-based maintenance strategies. The power of connected assets allows for the integration of condition-based maintenance with risk assessment and system resilience to create adaptive, optimized maintenance plans tailored to your specific site. This approach minimizes downtime by reducing unnecessary planned outages and focusing maintenance efforts on high-risk, critical assets. Real-time monitoring and risk analysis can identify where additional maintenance could significantly lower the likelihood of unplanned outages, maximizing the operational time and profitability of your assets.
While this IoT-driven approach to maintenance offers tremendous potential for maximizing profits, it also introduces new challenges, particularly in cybersecurity. As systems become increasingly interconnected, the risk of cyber threats could soon outweigh the risks of equipment failure if not properly managed with appropriate steps to ensure cybersecurity.
This presentation explores the steps required to implement risk-based maintenance safely and securely, ensuring you can maximize profitability while minimizing risk in your wind farm operations.
Speaker(s)
Andy Warner is the Global Service Sales Manager for Generation at Hitachi Energy where he has worked with some of the worlds largest Electricity Generators to provide maintenance services across the globe. Andy has worked in the power industry since 2018 and prior to that he worked in IT services for Computacenter and Arrow Electronics. This experience across both the energy industry and IT gives him an in-depth understanding of the importance of issues around cyber security and how digital solutions can optimize maintenance to help reduce risk of downtime, manage costs and maximize generation output.