Switchgear and Substations

3.1 High-Voltage Substations

3.1.3 Circuit Conguration

High-voltage substations are points in the power system where power can be pooled from generating sources, distributed and transformed, and delivered to the load points. Substations are interconnected with each other, so that the power system becomes a meshed network. This increases reliability of the power supply system by providing alternate paths for ow of power to take care of any contingency, so that power delivery to the loads is maintained and the generators do not face any outage. The high-voltage substation is a critical component in the power system, and the reliability of the power system depends upon the substation. Therefore, the circuit conguration of the high-voltage substation has to be selected carefully. Busbars are the part of the substation where all the power is concentrated from the incoming feeders, and distributed to the outgoing feeders. That means that the reliability of any highvoltage substation depends on the reliability of the busbars present in the power system. An outage of any busbar can have dramatic effects on the power system. An outage of a busbar leads to the outage of the transmission lines connected to it. As a result, the power ow shifts to the surviving healthy lines that are now carrying more power than they are capable of. This leads to tripping of these lines, and the cascading effect goes on until there is a blackout or similar situation. The importance of busbar reliability should be kept in mind when taking a look at the different busbar systems that are prevalent. Single-busbar scheme (1 BB) The applications of this simple scheme are distribution and transformer substations, and feeding industrial areas (g. 3.1-4). Because it has only one busbar and the minimum amount of equipment, this scheme is a low-cost solution that provides only limited availability. In the event of a busbar failure and during maintenance periods, there will be an outage of the complete substation. To increase the reliability, a second busbar has to be added. Double-busbar scheme (2 BB) The more complex scheme of a double-busbar system gives much more exibility and reliability during operation of the substation (g. 3.1-5). For this reason, this scheme is used for distribution and transformer substations at the nodes of the power supply system. It is possible to control the power ow by using the busbars independently, and by switching a feeder from one busbar to the other. Because the busbar disconnectors are not able to break the rated current of the feeder, there will be a short disruption in power ow.

Fig. 3.1-4: Special single busbar, H-scheme (1 BB)

Fig. 3.1-5: Double-busbar scheme (2 BB)

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Siemens Energy Sector Power Engineering Guide Edition 7.0