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NETWORK / 23 / SEPTEMBER 2018 HEAT NET WORKS Creating certainty M ost of us have felt the heat of this endlessly warm summer. So you'd be for - given for miss- ing the landmark announcement from the Competition Markets Authority (CMA) recommending that heat networks be regulated, with this oversight provided by Ofgem. This major milestone is the result of an intensive market study which found that not all heat network customers receive the levels of service expected of a utility provider. Introduction of regulation will be a significant change for the industry and, while this may be a surprise to some, at SSE Enterprise we actively welcome this development. Regulation can bring certainty to the industry, improving design standards to increase reliability, delivering enhanced and secured standards of customer service to make sure that investors' returns can't come at an undue expense to custom - ers. The call for regulation should not distract from the industry's simultaneous successes. We have already worked proactively to drive up standards for heat net- work customers, establishing the Heat Trust customer protection scheme and publishing a Code Following the CMA's recent announcement recommending regulation of the heat network market, Jody Pittaway from SSE Enterprise Heat looks at why this is a welcome development for the industry. of Practice to set out minimum design and build standards. In fact the call for regulation is complementary to the success of these voluntary schemes which, although positive developments, haven't been taken up across the entire industry. Regulation will ensure that all heat suppliers have to guarantee customer protection as well as de - signing and constructing schemes to ensure long term reliability and efficiency. Regulation can only deliver real customer benefits if it is pro - portionate and targeted at the right areas. A positive first step would be rolling out the already established Heat Trust Scheme nationally, extending its protec - tions to all customers by making it mandatory. This would be a simple way to give confidence to investors by building prag - matically on the best practices currently out there. Conversely, overly severe regulation runs the risk of stifling the market and in - vestors' appetite, putting an end to all of the industry's progress. The opportunity to develop a suitable regulatory framework provides the opportunity to advance the industry and benefit customers. The new regulator, whoever they are, must work with industry participants so it can deliver a market that works for all – especially the customer. Due to the increasing implementation of the IEC 61850 standard for communication between Intelligent Electronic Devices (IED) in operational substations, the world of protection engineering is evolving. Ali Abdulla, application specialist at OMICRON elaborates on this. As the power industry transitions towards a smarter grid, significant efforts have been made in digital communications to improve efficiency and performance in all tasks to reduce outages in case of faults. Nowadays, testing the increasingly complex automation and communications of intelligent protection devices consumes more time than testing the protection functionality. The replacement of part, or all, of the hardwired interfaces with communication links requires the development and implementation of new methods and tools so that engineers can maintain the same level of security during the testing process, while also taking advantage of all the benefits that IEC 61850 offers. As hard-wired schemes are converted to GOOSE and SV based schemes, test personnel will need new skills, testing methods and documentation tools to enable them to troubleshoot. The testing of protection devices and schemes in digital substations does indeed bring challenges, but it also presents new opportunities to conduct tests with greater safety and efficiency while contributing to the reliability of the grid. OMICRON has been involved in developments for testing IEC 61850 communication for over 15 years and is the market leader in providing advanced testing tools and training courses to serve protection engineers different needs: l Client/server communication l Sampled values l GOOSE l Binary I/O extension for power utility automation. For further information visit www.omicronenergy.com or email info.uk@omicronenergy. com I N D U S T RY I N S I G H T Powerful analysis of digital substations