Partial Discharge Surveys
EA Technology’s Partial Discharge (PD) surveys are available worldwide, using our market-leading instruments. They are conducted by qualified personnel, who are expert at analyzing the results to provide you with valuable reports on the condition of your assets. Our experts will provide you with an easy to understand, ‘traffic light’ status report which contains clear recommendations for managing your power assets based on their condition.
Why measure PD activity?
Put simply: Because 85% of disruptive substation failures are PD related. Once you have PD present, it will always increase and if left will inevitably cause a failure which may be sudden and catastrophic. PD is the most reliable indicator of the condition of insulation within live assets.
Benefits
- Prevent PD-related defects developing into failures and outages
- Collect valuable information on the health of assets and risks of them failing
- Enhance planning of maintenance and replacements, based on measured condition
- Improve network safety and reliability
Features
- Use of the latest instruments for detecting, measuring, locating, monitoring, recording and analyzing PD activity
- Expert engineers, backed by EA Technology’s 50+ years expertise in PD
- Clear reports and recommendations on how to use PD survey results
- Instruments measure Ultrasonic activity, Transient Earth Voltages (TEVs), Radio Frequency (RF) emissions, and cable PD currents using RFCTs.
- Reliable, independent reporting using our database of 20,000+ test results to give you the most accurate conclusions
Scope of PD Surveys
PD surveys can be carried out on indoor metal clad switchgear, most types of outdoor switchgear and the cable termination boxes of transformers. Other methods must be utilized to detect PD in cables or the windings of transformers/motors, but EA Technology can also provide these services in many cases if so desired. PD surveys can be delivered as part of a larger package of condition assessment measures, such as oil sampling of transformers for dissolved gas analysis purposes and trip profiling of circuit breakers.
Handheld instrument surveys
Using instruments manufactured by EA Technology, we can detect partial discharge activity via the emissions of ultrasound, TEV and/or RF associated with the phenomena. This service provides a snapshot of an asset’s condition at a point in time, and has been used to reduce catastrophic failures and network outages by customers all over the world for more than 20 years. Our technical staff go on site and complete the survey on the desired part of your network. Upon completion they will provide a detailed written report of the results, the conclusions that can be drawn and our recommendations on how to address issues or manage the assets.
Temporary installations of monitoring equipment
Where issues have been identified during a handheld survey, where intermittent PD activity is suspected or if an asset is of a critical nature, the use of a monitoring system that is installed for a brief period (typically 1-2 weeks) may be advised. The UltraTEV Monitor™ continuously measures and records PD activity (both TEV and ultrasonic) and allows detailed analysis of the data. Ambient temperature and relative humidity are also recorded, as these can strongly influence the level of surface discharge activity if it is present. Finally, this method can also be used where there are high levels of radio frequency background interference (caused by variable speed drives, uninterruptable power supplies, etc.) to differentiate between noise and discharge.
