Electrical Obsolescence Management: Proactive & Data Driven Mitigation Strategies

A company engineering team addressed the challenge of managing obsolete and/or aged electrical equipment assets in over 1000 substations. Given that some of the electrical equipment has been in service for 40+ years and the company estimated to spend nearly $1B over the last 10 years to replace obsolete equipment, it was critical that the engineering team manage the risk posed by aging and obsolete equipment to prevent unscheduled or prolonged outages. Previous work (i.e., IEEE PCIC papers in 2010 and 2014) outlined the company’s Obsolescence Management Program (OMP) methodology and execution strategies, equipment condition assessment program, OMP program challenges, and obsolescence mitigation strategies for low voltage (600 V class) and medium voltage (5 kV and 15 kV class) equipment. The paper presents advanced mitigation strategies devised by the engineering team for high voltage equipment (34.5 kV to 230 kV). In addition, the paper will present the OMP’s progress and the risk-based evaluation developed to prioritize replacement projects.