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WELCOME to the quarterly newsletter of the IEEE SF PES!
This newsletter is designed
to provide our SF Bay Area members with the latest information on events, services and news
regarding the electric power industry.
IEEE San Francisco Section
PES Membership
by Kris Buchholz
Did you ever wonder how IEEE assigns members to
Sections? Did you ever wonder if you were a member of the SF PES? It is
possible that you are a member of the IEEE PES, but may belong to any section throughout
Northern California. It is based on your mailing address. If you have your mailing address
in the East Bay, as I do, then your membership is probably affiliated with the
Oakland-East Bay Section.
If you have your mailing address in San Jose, you are probably affiliated with the
Santa Clara Valley Section. And so forth
Why is this important? If you are interested in electing your IEEE SF PES officers and
influencing the direction of your society, you would only be eligible to vote if you are
part of our SF Section. It also effects the treasury
of the Section. If you typically are supported by a particular Section. It would probably
benefit you through services, and the Section through the financial ability to provide
those services, to align your membership with that Section.
How do you change your Section affiliation? I’m glad you asked....
You complete a
Contiguous Section Affiliation form.
This form can be completed and
e-mailed, mailed or faxed to IEEE and they will realign your
membership with the Section you requested. If you have any questions regarding this process or
this form, please contact me.
IEEE GOLD
by Curt Irwin
The IEEE SF PES and the San Francisco GOLD
(Graduates Of theLast Decade) affinity group are working together to plan a social
gathering in upcoming weeks. The purpose of GOLD is to get young engineers involved
in professional and social/networking activities sponsored by
San Francisco GOLD and the
San Francisco IEEE section. These events are aimed at
benefiting GOLD members with long-term career development and enhancing social/financial planning opportunities.
Curt Irwin (an IEEE SF PES ADCOM member) will be leading the upcoming GOLD activities on behalf
of the IEEE SF PES. Details to follow soon. Curt can be reached at cpi3@pge.com.
October 2003 Short Course
Distributed Generation
by Shimo Wang
The IEEE SF PES hosted the
Distributed Generation (DG) Workshop on 18 October 2003 at San Francisco State University (SFSU). Seven instructors made
presentations. An audience of thirty-five engineers, consultants and college students from the
San Francisco Bay Area, Sacramento, Nevada and Vermont attended the workshop.
Read more...
California Energy Action Plan
November 2003 Technical Meeting
by Julian Ajello
At the 19 November 2003 meeting, Barbara Hale, the California Public
Utility Commission’s (PUC) Director of Strategic Planning described the
California Energy Action Plan (EAP). Prior to the 1 970s, California relied on utilities to plan for future
loads and resources. Needed new power plants and transmission lines were built with the approval of the
PUC. As a result of sharp price increases in oil and electricity during the 70s, the
California Energy Commission (CEC) was created to take over the resource planning function for the state. Restructuring
took resource planning out of the jurisdiction of government and utilities as well. The
assumption was that the market would provide needed new resources. That did not work well and a
need for structured resource planning became apparent.
To meet that need, Michael Peevey, President of the PUC called members
of the CEC and the California Power Authority (CPA) together; at first informally and later in formal
hearings. The result was the EAP adopted jointly by the three agencies in April 2003. The goal of
the EAP is to “Ensure that adequate, reliable, and reasonably-priced electrical power and natural
gas supplies, including prudent reserves, are achieved and provided through policies, strategies,
and actions that are cost-effective and environmentally sound for California’s consumers and taxpayers.”
The three agencies have not always had harmonious relations but in the EAP, they pledge to work
closely together to achieve the above goal through joint hearings and joint recommendations to the
governor and the legislature. The EAP returns the responsibility for acquiring new resources to the
utilities but seeks to give incentives for efficient spending.
The EAP lists six actions that must be undertaken immediately:
1. Optimize Energy Conservation and Resource Efficiency
2. Accelerate the State’s Goal for Renewable Generation
3. Ensure Reliable, Affordable Electricity Generation
4. Upgrade & Expand the Electricity Transmission & Distribution Infrastructure
5. Promote Customer and Utility Owned Distributed Generation
6. Ensure Reliable Supply of Reasonably Priced Natural Gas
Ms. Hale was closely involved with the development of the EAP and provided
fascinating insights into the process from the initial intimate dinners to the formal hearings.
Ms. Hale came to the Commission in 1988 from an economic consulting firm. She started in
Alternative Generation, but soon became an advisor to the Commission’s President. She also
served as an administrative law judge for several years before assuming her current post in 2001.
Newark SVC Facility Tour
September 2003 Technical Tour
by Bhaskar Ray
On 18 September 2003, a tour was provided by Bhaskar Ray of Pacific Gas and Electric
(PG&E) to the Static VAR Compensator (SVC) facility at Newark Substation. Newark Substation is
located in the city of Fremont, near Silicon Valley. PG&E installed a 230kV (-100/+220 MVAR) SVC
system to retire six aging synchronous condensors at the Newark site. This SVC installation, designed by
ABB, is an application of Flexible AC Transmission Systems (FACTS) Technology and was installed at Newark
Substation in June 2002. The SVC tour was attended by twelve people and lasted for about ninety minutes.
Bhaskar gave an overview of the facility describing the project background and need of this sophisticated
voltage control facility. Technical studies conducted by PG&E confirmed the need to install a fast acting
dynamic FACTS device at Newark Substation. The addition of an SVC in the Bay Area helps to maintain an
acceptable and necessary reactive reserve margin to prevent voltage instability from unscheduled generation
or transmission outages during high load conditions and to prevent blackouts in the Bay Area.
Urban Strandberg from ABB acted as the tour guide and provided a good description
of the functional components of this SVC facility. The SVC design is based on ABB’s experience from
numerous other utility SVCs. It meets all listed PG&E requirements resulting in excellent performance
and reliability. An SVC is comprised of thyristor switched capacitors (TSC), thyristor-controlled
reactors (TCR) and harmonic filters (HF) which create the required dynamic reactive range (inductive and
capacitive) to provide rapid reactive power and voltage modulation during system disturbances that
conventional slow switched shunt capacitors and reactors are unable to provide. The SVC is
connected to the 230kV system at the Newark Substation and consists of one 154 MVAR TCR, one 166
MVA TSC and two 274 MVAR filter branches tuned to the 5th and 7th harmonic respectively, giving the
SVC an operating range from 100 MVAR inductive to 220 MVAR capacitive. The SVC is connected to the
230kV grid via three single-phase power transformers. In addition to the SVC, three Mechanically
Switched Capacitors (MSC) are connected to the 230kV bus located in the Newark Substation.
The MSCs are operated either automatically from the SVC control or remotely from the PG&E Control
Center. The SVC is controlled by a microprocessor based control system. The control system is
based on the MACH 2 concept, built around an industrial PC with add-in circuit boards and I/O
racks connected via standard type field buses. Dedicated voltage and current transformers
provide the control system with information of the network condition, used to control the SVC.
The control system provides facilities for SVC control either form the Operator Work Station (OWS) in
the SVC control room or remotely via a conventional RTU/SCADA system.
The EAP lists six actions that must be undertaken immediately:
1. Optimize Energy Conservation and Resource Efficiency
2. Accelerate the State’s Goal for Renewable Generation
3. Ensure Reliable, Affordable Electricity Generation
4. Upgrade & Expand the Electricity Transmission & Distribution Infrastructure
5. Promote Customer and Utility Owned Distributed Generation
6. Ensure Reliable Supply of Reasonably Priced Natural Gas
Ms. Hale was closely involved with the development of the EAP and provided
fascinating insights into the process from the initial intimate dinners to the formal hearings.
Ms. Hale came to the Commission in 1988 from an economic consulting firm. She started in
Alternative Generation, but soon became an advisor to the Commission’s President. She also
served as an administrative law judge for several years before assuming her current post in 2001.
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