ABB’s RTU in the smart grid of Infrax

Infrax decided to automate 108 existing MV/LV substations in the Western region of Belgium. Due to increasing Distributed Energy Resources (DER), Active power (P), and Reactive power (Q) measurements of the loads as inputs for the SCADA-DMS systems were needed to replace the static load profiles. These 108 regional substations were manually operated. The aim of the project was to upgrade the manual switches to be motor operated and remote controlled. The former layout of the stations was a mix of different solutions and versions with different single lines of which a few were already equipped with circuit breakers and protection relays. Some had auxiliary voltage supply only. Infrax determined the following requirements for the secondary systems: First, the RTU solution should be the same for all station layout types. Second, a need for 16 outputs to operate 8 Load Break Switches and approx. 50 digital inputs was expressed. Furthermore, the position of maximum 8 Load Break Switches and 8 Earth Switches as well as up to 4 Short-Circuit Indicators was obligatory. In addition 5 alarm signals from the energy supply were requested, as well as local and remote switches and temperature and Buchholz alarms. Finally, the transformer load measurement was: Active power (P) and Reactive power(Q) for SCADA-DMS. ABB offered the DIN Rail RTU560 based on 560CMG10 with IEC 60870-5-104 protocol and up to 250 data points. The solution was extended with one power supply 560PSU4x, 110/24VDC or 48/24VDC, one input module 23BE50, 64 inputs, one output module 23BA40, 16 outputs, one measuring module 560CVT02, P, Q, U, I and one communication module, DSL (RMS521) or alternatively a GPRS router.