Substation Maintenance & Upgrades: Retrofitting vs. Replacement - Southwest Electric

Substation Maintenance & Upgrades: Retrofitting vs. Replacement

Substations play a vital role in your business’s critical infrastructure. Maintaining the reliability of these power stations is crucial to reducing problems that may arise while also protecting the equipment and enhancing your operational efficiency. However, their reliability begins to suffer when your substations suffer from poor maintenance and an aging infrastructure. The good news is that proactive measures on your part can help prevent these disruptions. This article will briefly discuss good maintenance practices, the challenges associated with modernization, and compare retrofitting and full replacements of your equipment.

 

Substation Maintenance

Firstly, it is essential to understand substations’ function and importance when discussing maintenance. Substations play an important part in your facility’s power distribution process by adjusting voltage levels for efficient energy transmission. Their stabilization of these voltage levels prevents grid faults and helps to manage the power flow, ultimately resulting in a reliable electrical supply to your equipment. Routine maintenance can prove invaluable for your substation’s reliability in preventing equipment failures while extending the lifespan of its critical components.

Neglecting proper maintenance can result in a whole host of problems for your equipment and facility in the long run. Increased risk of safety hazards like fires and electrical faults, as well as reduced system efficiency, can lead to significant financial losses, regulatory penalties, and damage to your company’s reputation. Making routine maintenance a habit and prioritizing system health now can save you from future headaches and unnecessary replacements to your equipment.

When discussing maintenance, it is essential to understand what key components must be assessed and tested regularly within your equipment. Regular inspection of key substation components, such as transformers, circuit breakers, switchgear, and protective relays, is crucial to your facility’s health. Thorough monitoring of critical grounding, insulation, and cooling systems for wear, damage, or inefficiencies will allow you to stay on top of issues, hopefully preventing them before they arise. For a breakdown of some of Southwest Electric Co.’s routine testing as part of our evaluation process, click here. How often these inspections and maintenance procedures are conducted depends on individual factors such as equipment type, age, usage, and environmental conditions. Still, a good rule of thumb is to perform monthly visual inspections, annual maintenance, and comprehensive assessments every couple of years. Once areas of concern have been evaluated, you can take proper measures to improve your equipment’s operational efficiency.

By utilizing the proper tools, methods, and procedures, your preventive maintenance can ensure the operational longevity of your substation and its equipment. Combining proper maintenance with modernization can help enhance your substation’s safety and reliability by addressing both existing wear and outdated technology.

 

Upgrading Challenges

Many of the challenges that we will discuss below should be weighed and considered prior to starting. You should invest a great deal of time into the pre-planning process because it will allow you to minimize downtime and create a seamless transition with your new equipment and components. Upgrading your equipment has various benefits ranging from increased safety and reliability to more streamlined maintenance and efficiency. However, an essential factor to consider when deciding to modernize your substation is the challenges such a decision can pose.

Aging infrastructure, while being a reason for upgrading, can also create an issue in reaching your desired goal. You may find that the older equipment in your facility is incompatible with the more modern systems available. This can result from increased complexity, thus leading to a need for extensive modifications or even complete replacements to accommodate the upgrades, space limitations, and safety standards. This process can become further complicated when you must deal with roadblocks like outdated or missing documentation, making it difficult to plan an upgrade for your facility. Navigating these challenges and the financial and logistical considerations can complicate the process if proper preparations and planning are not taken. A good place to start the planning process is by deciding what upgrade method will best suit your facility’s needs.

 

Retrofitting Vs. Replacement

When upgrading your facility, you must decide whether to opt for retrofitting or a complete replacement. Each option has its own pros and cons, which should be thoroughly evaluated and tailored to the needs of your facility and project.

 

Retrofitting

Retrofitting is the process of upgrading your facility’s existing equipment, structures, and systems to enhance their capabilities. This approach is different from a “full replacement” because it involves making upgrades or improvements without replacing the original equipment. Retrofitting is an optimal way to preserve your existing infrastructure in a cost-effective and customizable way.

 

Pros

With retrofitting, the benefits are what you would expect for a minimalist approach. Below, I have outlined the four positive aspects I believe come with the decision to approach your project with retrofitting in mind.

  • Minimized Downtime: Retrofitting allows for minor changes to your systems over time, reducing unscheduled system downtime and service interruptions.
  • Infrastructure preservation: Allows you to retain equipment that doesn’t need replacement during the upgrade process. In addition to being cost-effective, it results in your facility not requiring the dismantling or replacing of your systems.
  • Quick Installation: Retrofitting, as a more modular approach, allows for a fast installation process during a scheduled downtime since your facility’s foundational equipment is typically reused.
  • Cost Efficient: As mentioned previously, this method is more cost-effective since it leverages already existing equipment. In addition, the need for expenditure related to, disposal, and new layouts is lower than that of a full replacement.

Cons

With every decision, one must also evaluate the cons. The drawbacks of retrofitting lean more heavily in the direction of integration and longevity, which you will see below.

  • Limited Lifespan: One drawback to retrofitting is its inability to fully address your facility’s aging equipment. Some issues with regard to aging infrastructure may be mitigated through retrofitting, but in the end, attempting to make adjustments to your old equipment may result in your substation requiring further upgrades somewhere down the road.
  • Compatibility Issues: Another issue to consider is that the upgrades you desire may simply not integrate with your aging infrastructure. This can result in your team having to look at the problem from an engineering perspective and how to can make the equipment or component better suit your project needs.
  • Performance Constraints: Much like the compatibility issues, the performance of your retrofitted gear may be at odds with your older equipment, leading to less optimal performance and additional need for upgrade.
  • Hidden Issues: unforeseen issues can arise, like unseen weaknesses and damage with regards to your system. Although not unique to retrofitting, newly discovered damage may lead to the need for entire sections of your equipment to undergo maintenance, repair, and even further upgrades.

 

Replacement

While retrofitting aims to minimize the extent to which your system will undergo invasive upgrading, full replacement involves an intense overhaul of your system’s equipment during the upgrade process. Below, I have outlined four benefits to consider when deciding on a full replacement approach.

 

Pros

The benefits of full replacements typically revolve around the efficiency and longevity of the new equipment. Below, I will outline the four positive benefits of going the full replacement route with your infrastructure upgrades.

  • Enhanced Performance & Reliability: More modern components will be more advanced, reliable, and capable of handling the demands your facility places on them. In addition, with new equipment comes better safety and greater operational assurance that aging components won’t pose any risk to the health of your system.
  • Scalability: Another significant benefit is that modern systems can be installed with a forward-thinking mindset. This upgraded structure ensures that your gear can always evolve to adhere to the latest standards while allowing your team to plan for and fully integrate future expansions when needed.
  • Extended Lifespan: With new equipment comes a fresh start. The new components of your set will reduce maintenance costs and extend the operational lifespan of your equipment.
  • Improved Safety: A full replacement will allow your systems to incorporate modern and updated safety features, thus reducing risk to your facility as well as your team.

Cons

The drawbacks to fully replacing your equipment for modernization will revolve around facility downtime and drawn-out adjustment periods. Below, I have outlined three main downsides I have encountered when dealing with an entirely new system.

  • Costly Start-Up: Due to the scope of the project, full replacement will be far more expensive than retrofitting. Expenses like material, labor, and structure will all require more involvement, resulting in a higher cost overall.
  • Long Downtime: Replacing a significant amount of your components will naturally require shutting down the system during the replacement process. Where a retrofit’s downtime may be partial and fast, that of a full replacement will be significantly longer and potentially disrupt productivity leading to financial loss.
  • Adjustment Period: A fully new system will have an adjustment period for your team while they undergo new and potentially extensive training, which can add to the cost and timeline of the upgrade.

 

Real World Application

Being aware of the challenges as well as the pros and cons of retrofitting and full replacements is an important first step in your upgrade process. How you apply this knowledge moving forward will allow you to choose the best option for you. To help illustrate the type of challenges that can arise throughout the process, I will briefly outline a project I worked on.

The project involved my team retrofitting bushings on our client’s set of transformers. An issue that arose was that the new bushings didn’t directly fit into the transformer due to the turret being too tall. We were dealing with transformers that were sixty to seventy years old, and manufacturers weren’t making updated bushings that fit into the transformer anymore. Manufacturers used to make more direct replacements but have moved away from that in favor of more universal options. We were faced with the issue of our newer equipment not properly integrating the way that we would have liked. Due to limited alternative options, our solutions resulted in us modifying the transformer’s turrets. The turret that the bushing connected with didn’t have any CTS which opened up the option for us to modify the height to better accommodate the bushings. We were able to engineer a solution that adjusted the height so we could set the depth of the bushings inside the transformer tank. We then were able to modify the connections to the bushings to fix the issue further. This solution allowed us to continue performing the retrofit without having to fully replace the units.

Pre-planning can help mitigate many of the challenges your team may encounter, but sometimes the nature of your upgrade results in immediate challenges needing your attention. Whether that’s immediate adjustments to the equipment or the alteration of turret height for bushing installation, it is important to be aware of the challenges and have prepared solutions in order to minimize project difficulties.

 

Closing Thoughts

In conclusion, maintaining and modernizing your substation infrastructure is essential for ensuring operational reliability, safety, and efficiency. By prioritizing routine maintenance and addressing aging infrastructure, businesses can extend the lifespan of critical equipment and minimize the risk of costly failures. When it comes to modernization, understanding the challenges and weighing the pros and cons of retrofitting versus full replacement allows you to make informed decisions that align with your facility’s unique needs. While retrofitting offers cost-effective solutions with minimal disruption, full replacements provide enhanced performance, scalability, and safety. Ultimately, proactive planning, regular assessments, and a clear upgrade strategy are key to overcoming potential challenges and achieving a seamless and successful modernization process.

 

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Looking to find out what it takes to keep your operation up and running? Check out some of our previously articles and videos by clicking the links below!

Maintenance Strategies: A Step-by-Step Approach (swelectric.com)

The Importance of Electrical Testing Your Transformer – Southwest Electric (swelectric.com)

Transformer Oil: Everything You Need to Know – Southwest Electric (swelectric.com)

Which Oil Tests Should I Run on my Transformers?