Location
Gronau
Year
2017 to 2018
Products
FW-5, FW-5-GATE-4G, FW-50
Protocol
Modbus RTU, Modbus TCP, IEC 60870-5-104
Due to the more conscious use of resources and the increasingly necessary automation in the supply area, telecontrol technology now takes over the ripple control and other obsolete techniques in many areas of application: Stadtwerke Gronau, for example, is now optimising the targeted control and management of its street lighting using SAE telecontrol technology.
Information is collected in the local network stations of the city using network analysis systems as well as intelligent CompassB short-circuit and earth-fault direction indicators from Horstmann and coupled via Modbus RTU or TCP to the telecontrol system from SAE IT-systems. Short-circuit indicators are also connected in the medium-voltage systems and signal transmissions are set up for the status of the switch positions. The telecontrol system transmits the relevant information to the I/O modules of the road control panels via Modbus RTU. Depending on the station, the data is sent securely to the control centre via the Stadtwerke’s own infrastructure (LWL or copper).
The advantages are clearly recognisable in practice: Errors are detected more quickly, and their causes are localised more quickly and visualised in the network control system. This makes maintenance work even more targeted and efficient. Due to the decentralized structure, errors do not result in complete failure of the lighting system, and individual areas or roads can be illuminated more efficiently, depending on the light requirements. Worth mentioning in this context are also the synergy effects for the electricity operation and for the operation of the street lighting.
The public utilities organisation “Stadtwerke Gronau” is also progressive in their safety issues: To secure the systems, they use the user management of the SAE software and work with their own VLAN for the control of the local network station and street lighting. Communication with other VLANs takes place exclusively via redundant firewalls.
The project started rolling out at the beginning of 2017 and should be completed by the end of 2018. 135 street lighting switching points and 7,266 lanterns are to be connected by 2018.
The public utility organisation “Stadtwerke Northeim” is also currently implementing telecontrol technology in the street lighting system of the city of Northeim. In this case, the street lighting is usually switched off between 1 o’clock and 5 o’clock in the morning. Thanks to the telecontrol technology of SAE IT-systems and the specially integrated logic, the police and fire brigade control centre can automatically switch on the street lighting in a particular area even during night operations. In addition, the joint standby services of Stadtwerke Northeim and Gemeindewerke Bovenden can easily switch on the lighting in Northeim and Bovenden manually with just a few clicks in exceptional situations, even from home.