as installing sophisticated power source equipment.
Given the amount of time needed for the expanded Koeberg site to be finished and commissioned, insulator testing at Eskom will continue using a modularized scheme based on facilities enclosed in large shipping containers placed inside a substation. Among these will be a salt fog chamber, with office, test bay and associated power sources and support equipment. There will also be an inclined plane test set-up for AC and DC as well as a tracking wheel.
Says Vosloo,“ we feel confident in saying that our formalized testing requirements at KIPTS, imposed on every insulator supplier to Eskom since 2002, have helped advance insulator technology in general. The proof is that today some 90 percent of products tested pass – a 50 % increase over the pass level at the start. More important to Eskom, in the process we have also eliminated a lot of the problems we once had on transmission lines.” �
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Opposite page and top photo: Soon-to-be-completed Sterrekus Substation will become key facility within new 765 kV Eskom transmission grid.
I Paved driveway at 400 kV Stikland Substation expected to be location of Eskom’ s planned new modularized testing facilities.
Photos: INMR ©
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