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Case Study:
UK Power Networks
Secondary Automation
The challenge
UK Power Networks delivers electricity
across London, the East and South
East of England, serving eight million
customers and covering just under
30,000 square kilometres.
To meet increased demand from customers, especially
in rural areas, UK Power Networks is constantly improving
its network infrastructure to increase reliability of power
transmission efficiency, and to minimise costs.
In particular, the company wanted to improve the
performance of its switchgear equipment in electricity
substations, by updating approximately 3,000
switchgear units.
which UK Power Networks owns would therefore have
been expensive, as well as unnecessary, so a different
solution had to be reached.
It was a sizeable project, and UK Power Networks had a
limited budget and needed the work completed without
interrupting customers’ power supplies.
UK Power Networks chose Lucy Switchgear because of
its skills and expertise in medium voltage switchgear
particularly in retrofitting Lucy Switchgear products and
other legacy manufacturers’ switchgear.
Due to the resilience of switchgear equipment,
a significant proportion of the UK’s existing switchgear
infrastructure is several decades old, however it still easily
operates at optimum levels. Replacing the equipment
Trident
Our solution
Lucy Switchgear began the process by
retrofitting approximately 1,400
switchgear ring main units (RMUs)
with actuator kits.
This allowed for each unit to be automated and
controlled remotely at a central control station, thereby
enabling UK Power Networks’ technical teams to monitor
the electrical distribution network and locate faults
within seconds, rather than the hours potentially required
by manual fault detection, particularly in rural areas.
Through the process, faults are isolated from the central
control centre and rectified with minimal interruption to
the distribution network, thereby limiting the impact on
customers as well as helping UK Power Networks to meet
their customer lost minutes targets.
Lucy Switchgear’s retrofitting process also meant that
existing infrastructure could be retrofitted while the
electricity is still live, again lessening the impact on
customers and the pressures on the network.
A number of the retrofit kits were made bespoke for the
project by Lucy Switchgear so as to operate and
modernise equipment developed by other
manufacturers, while other RMUs utilised existing Lucy
Switchgear designs. The full list of equipment used is
listed to the right:
• Lucy Switchgear FRMU Right Hand Automation Retrofit Actuator Kit (Lucy Part No: THM0025424)
• Lucy Switchgear FRMU Left Hand Automation Retrofit Actuator Kit (Lucy Part No: THM0025423)
• Lucy Switchgear FRMU Right Hand and Left Hand Automation Retrofit Actuator Kit (Lucy Part No: THM0025425)
• Long & Crawford T3GF3/T4GF3 Right Hand Automation Retrofit Actuator Kit (Lucy Part No: THM0025444)
• Long & Crawford T3GF3/T4GF3 Right Hand and Left Hand Automation Retrofit Actuator Kit (Lucy Part No: THM0025446)
• Long & Crawford T3GF3/T4GF3 Left Hand Automation Retrofit Actuator Kit (Lucy Part No: THM0025441)
• Long & Crawford J3/J4 Automation Retrofit Actuator Kit
(Lucy Part No: THM0025439)
• Reyrolle JS Automation Retrofit Actuator Kit
(Lucy Part No: THM0025438)
• Lucy Switchgear SABRE 1/2 Left Hand Automation Retrofit
Actuator Kit (Lucy Part No: THM0025428)
• Lucy Switchgear SABRE 1/2 Right Hand Automation Retrofit Actuator Kit (Lucy Part No: THM0025430)
• Lucy Switchgear SABRE 1/2 Right Hand and Left Hand Automation Retrofit Actuator Kit (Lucy Part No: THM0025434)
• Brush NSM Right Hand and Left Hand (plus new NSM Door) Automation Retrofit Actuator Kit (Lucy Part No: THM0025437)
• Brush NSM Right Hand (plus new NSM Door) Automation Retrofit Actuator Kit (Lucy Part No: THM0025436)
• Brush NSM Left Hand (plus new NSM Door) Automation Retrofit Actuator Kit (Lucy Part No: THM0025435)
• Lucy Switchgear SABRE VRN2a Right Hand Automation Retrofit Actuator Kit (Lucy Part No: THM0025420)
• Lucy Switchgear SABRE VRN2a Left Hand Automation Retrofit Actuator Kit (Lucy Part No: THM0025422)
Outcome
The automation project maximised the
asset life of UK Power Networks’
installed asset base and resulted in
significant cost savings due to the
benefits of retrofitting rather than
replacing the existing equipment.
“ Lucy Switchgear’s knowledge and flexibility were
key to allowing us to meet our targets. Their
automation equipment, in-depth switchgear
knowledge and project management experience
has made a significant difference to our
operations, and to our customers.”
UK Power Networks
It has also led to a more reliable network, as the
automation process means faults can be identified and
isolated in less than 3 minutes, significantly reducing the
length of power cuts and keeping response times under
the regulator, Ofgem’s, targets.
www.lucyswitchgear.com
LSCS-UKPN-1113
Employing a retrofit solution also saved the company
planning and implementation time. The entire
automation project took less than 18 months to
complete, whereas it is estimated that replacing the
switchgear would have taken approximately 3 years.

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