SuperGrid Institute’s DC circuit breaker goes public
at the IEEE General Meeting in Denver

We are proud to be revealing our 525kV DC circuit breaker at the IEEE Power & Energy Society General Meeting. The breaker is adapted for both non-selective & selective protection strategies thanks to its very low reaction time. This technology combines reliable interruption, even at small currents, with a large range of short circuit currents. By stacking its modular units this innovative solution can also be adapted to network voltages ranging from medium voltage to the highest transmission voltages.

The DC circuit breaker is a critical element for enabling the operation of meshed DC networks. We have recently made a major step forward by confirming the performance of our design via in-house power tests, at medium & high voltages and have also just finished a series of mechanical endurance tests which produced very encouraging results, confirming that our confidence in this solution is well placed. We are now ready to present our solution to other industry players and support them in the integration of this technology into future energy networks.

A few modules (partial view) of the 525kV DC current injection circuit breaker

Wolfgang Grieshaber, DC Circuit Breaker Technology Research Group Leader at SuperGrid Institute, was invited to chair a Panel Session dedicated to the latest advances and trends in High Voltage DC circuit breakers alongside Dragan Jovcic (Aberdeen University). The session, entitled “Recent advances on DC circuit breaker development and its implementation into a DC grid protection strategy” will take place on Wednesday the 20^th of July 2022 from 10:00 AM – 12:00 PM

• Panel Session: Latest Advances and Trends in High Voltage DC Circuit Breakers
• Date: Wednesday the 20^th of July 2022
• Time: 10:00 AM – 12:00 PM (local time – Denver, Colorado, USA)

Another of our engineers, Sebastien Silvant, HVDC Interoperability Project Manager, is taking part in a second panel session where he will present his take on how to make HVDC grids modular and interoperable. In his talk, he will discuss the steps that can be taken to achieve interoperability by design:  agreeing on a common functional framework for multi-terminal HVDC control and protection systems, splitting the functional scope between subsystems & defining the resulting standard interfaces, and eventually issuing functional specifications that are as open as possible and as precise as necessary. Only a joint effort between industrial stakeholders will make it possible to reach the necessary consensus. HVDC interoperability will unlock multi-vendor HVDC grids and impact further transition of the energy sector at a large scale.

• Panel Session: Towards interoperability in VSC-HVDC Networks
• Date: Tuesday the 19^th of July 2022
• Time: 8:00 AM – 12:00 PM (local time – Denver, Colorado, USA)