Photos: INMR ©
Watson sprays sides of DDG( top and bottom right) to allow dust along sides to collect in bottom receptacles.
If you receive an email from Robbie Watson, it will invariably end with these words,“ Those who measure, know!” Well, for Watson and his colleagues, this is not simply a slick slogan but in fact an expression of the dogma that influences much of what they do in practice.
Once a month, for over a decade now, Watson sets out on the same long journey to collect data at selected points scattered across a vast area. Each trip is arduous yet one that he recognizes provides vital input to reliable operation of the grid. Says Watson,“ all the information I gather ends up helping our design engineers select the proper insulator creepage needed at substations. And, extrapolating pollution data from one site to the next allows us to understand how pollution is affecting our lines as well.”
Watson remarks that pollution flashovers, such as massive ones that blacked out much of the Western Cape in 2000, have been recurring problems over the years. The only way to anticipate such events and react in a timely manner, he reasons, is by constantly monitoring ESDD levels that affect insulators. In the case of Eskom, this is done using a far-flung network of substations and other selected sites where directional dust deposit gauges( DDGs) as well as strings of reference glass insulators are installed. It is Watson’ s responsibility to visit these installations across the Western Cape and conduct analyses of what he finds.
Insulation specialist, Wallace Vosloo, has worked alongside Watson for over 20 years and was among the team that‘ procedurized’ testing at the Koeberg Insulator Pollution Test Station( KIPTS) for many of the components that Eskom purchases. Apart from insulators, these include all items relying on external
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