About the project
With the Sheffield Substation sometimes being called on to supply more than half of the total amount of electricity transmitted through our system, ensuring the facility is at peak performance is critical. Built more than 40 years ago Sheffield provides transmission connections for the electricity generated from Hydro Tasmania’s power stations in the Mersey-Forth, Pieman-Anthony and King catchments.
In 2007, work began on a $20 million project to redevelop both the 110 kV and 220 kV switchyards at the station. Much of the equipment in the 110 kV switchyard was becoming unreliable and expensive to maintain as it neared the end of its service life while the configuration of the 220 kV switchyard no longer met our substation design criteria for that voltage.
To address these issues, existing equipment was updated to improve efficiency and reliability. New equipment was added where appropriate, including new bus bars, voltage and current transformers, circuit breakers, post insulators, lightning protection system, and transformer and bus bar protection systems. A new SCADA (supervisory control and data acquisition) system also was installed.
The benefits
The redevelopment has ensured we can continue to comply with the performance criteria in the National electricity rules and the Tasmanian transmission Network Security and Planning Criteria. The upgrade also has addressed an identified weakness in the transmission system, guaranteeing improved reliability and security of services. The new SCADA system has improved communications between the substation and the central network operation and control system.
Completion date
The redevelopment was completed by September 2008.