Power System Consultancy Areas
Aurora provides a wide range of power system consultancy services. We support our Clients in a wide range of activities, by providing support to their in-house knowledge. The scope of our consultancy activities can vary enormously and has ranged from helping developing initial system concepts, site surveys, acting as Client / Owners engineer, due diligence services, investigating protection tripping investigations, and providing guidance on planned upgrade strategies.
At Aurora we pride ourselves on offering, practical, clear, cost effective and concise advice on how to tackle problems. Aurora’s power system consultants have worked on a wide range of large international projects as well as smaller UK based projects, and have experience of systems in the UK, Europe, North America, the Middle East and Africa; and a wide variety of projects including renewable power, transmission & distribution, process plants, mining facilities, water / sewage processing, power generation and building services.
Some of the more common power system consultancy areas are detailed below:
Grid Connection Support
When a company is considering a new development, it is usually necessary ether to get a new electrical supply from the DNO or upgrade the existing supply. While this may sound straight forward, DNOs can often be difficult to deal with directly and will frequently ask for information that may not readily available or in the specific form they require. Aurora can act on a Clients behalf to liaise directly with the DNO, and help gather the correct information, present it in a suitable way and complete the associated paperwork. In addition Aurora can help analyse different options of DNO supply approaches and advise on the most suitable, and cost effective approach.
Concept Development
Developing an initial power system design concept, can seem like a daunting task, as there are many factors to consider and which require compromises between performance, reliability and cost. Aurora can help develop these designs to meet these conflicting requirements and help optimize any potential power system design, or plans for future expansion. As part of the concept development stage we will consider issues such as system redundancy, cost, suitable voltage levels, fault levels, equipment ratings and market availability as well as more frequently forgotten considerations like operability, expandability, outage planning and tie-ins. Aurora can help your in-house team come up with realistic cost estimates for projects and help shape decisions on the best investment strategy for any capital assets.
Guidance on New Technologies and Markets
Power systems are changing rapidly, with new technologies and market products being developed and introduced by vendors and system operators. Aurora can help our Clients navigate this complicated area by providing clear guidance on how thee technologies are likely to affect system operation and plant design, and interpreting the technical requirements of new ancillary services requested by the TSO.
System Upgrade Advice
Power system frequently require upgrades due to equipment limits being exceeded, or exceeding their working life, and this can cause difficulties to owners who then face the difficulty of how to expand, or upgrade an operational plant in a cost effective way, without facing a major shut-down and loss of operational service. In these scenarios Aurora can examine the operation of the power system and try and identify mitigation strategies, tie-in points and give advice on planning network outages and developing strategies that allow upgrade of existing, overloaded systems without putting the system at risk.
Site Surveys
Aurora can attend a Client Site to carry out a high level site survey to assess the system configuration, operation and performance, and provide guidance on its suitability and condition. Surveys can consideration issues such as network topology, switchgear and transformer ratings, suitability of protection equipment, and identifying any bottlenecks. This can be done as part of planned routine maintenance, or in anticipation of planned upgrade and expansion works.
ICP / DNO Scope and Proposal Development and Review
Many project developers have limited in house technical expertise, and this can make dealing with DNOs a difficult and challenging task, similarly preparing and writing clear project scope for potential ICPs to bid against can also be challenging, so that all ICPs are bidding against the same project requirements, and scope is not missed or misunderstood. At Aurora we can work with you, to help liaise with the DNOs to ensure that their proposals are constraints are understood by everyone, and suggest changes to the project design to reduce or eliminate network reinforcement costs. Likewise we can act as an impartial review of ICP proposals to check that multiple bids are all based on the same project scope, and there are no unexpected exclusions.