Arc Aid Trial Expansion

Concepts

• bristol
• arc aid trial expansion
• a joint nia arc aid project
• trial
• arc
• expansion
• aid
• budgetary sign
• metrysense sensors
• sensors

Location

Description

Purchase of MetrySense 5000 sensors and the associated analysis software licenses to expand the trial developed during a joint NIA Arc Aid project. There will be an initial purchase of 130 sets of MetrySense sensors to test the scalability of the solution with an option to purchase an additional 106 sets of sensors, subject to successful implementation and budgetary sign off.

Award Detail

CPV Codes

• None found

Legal Justification

Competition is absent for technical reasons and there are no reasonable alternatives (Procurement Act 2023, Schedule 5, paragraph 6): Arc Suppression Coil (ASC) earthed systems are prevalent on the 33kV and 11kV distribution networks in National Grid Electricity Distribution's (NGED) South West licence area. They were developed early in the 20th century due to the difficulty in achieving low enough earth resistance to operate the incumbent protection systems for high-impedance earth faults. A drawback of ASC systems is that they cannot identify the earth fault location or the specific faulty feeder. Consequently, network control engineers typically must carry out strategic network switching to isolate the faulted feeder, often disconnecting customers on healthy feeders in the process. A joint Network Innovation Allowance (NIA) project 'Arc Aid' was created between UK Power Networks (UKPN) and NGED and successfully developed and trialled a novel advanced grid sensor, the MetrySense 5000, developed by Megger to solve this issue and integrate the results into the NGED Network Management System. Building on the success of the NIA project, this contract seeks to deploy and test this solution at scale.

Other Information

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