Adapting alternative ways of insulation for the sector

When you have decentralised operations, a lot of connections can be managed better.

Our core agenda is to transform our systems business in India. Our systems include medium voltage switchgears and transformers, among other aspects, and of late, we have started introducing new products and offers with value propositions for the Indian market as well. We are attempting to shift our dependence on SF6, a greenhouse gas that largely contributes to global warming. We are making efforts to move away from this gas in switchgears, which should be accomplished in coming years. Schneider Electric’s CEO, Jean-Pascal Tricoire, has made a commitment that SF6 will be done away with from our operations by 2025, which is a decent target that Schneider hopes to meet in the coming years.

Unconventional choices for SF6
Here, one must consider the problem statement. The only reason why we opted for SF6 is the need for “compactness”. You require minimal floor space when things are compact or highly compact. At the same time, we need to think about what else can be offered with compactness, as the primary objective is to cater better performance and efficiency, among others. SF6 is a good candidate for this, but being a greenhouse gas, it is one of the primary concerns, having 0.1 percent occupancy in switchgear. SF6 usually stays in the atmosphere and it cannot be eliminated for the next 2,000-odd years.

Removing SF6 completely could take many years unless there is a concentrated effort. Our industry is very conservative. People stick to what they have seen, worked with and experienced. They go with facts, as every transformation has its own set of risks. You must be aware of your choices and actions, and the process can be eased only if we make a concentrated effort. We at Schneider think, “Can we make the technology more mature by the next five years so that we can tell everybody, including our customers, to shift from the existing technologies? Our perspective is that within the next five years, the technology would have matured and we would be in a much better place to make that switch.

Upgradation plans
There is no midway. We are really going after SF6 eradication in our products in the next few years. We will analyse our products and perceive if we can move away from SF6. The first product that you will see is called SM6. It is not widely used in India, but it is very widely used around the world and is very popular. We have been selling this product for the last 30-40 years. And the best thing is that the customer who is using it right now can simply take the existing switches and replace them with the new switch. The dimensions and other aspects are exactly the same. The next one that we have is a ring main unit, which is again not used in India widely. It’s called RM6, and we hope to make it commercialised soon.

No country has banned SF6 right now. But we keep hearing that the European Union is thinking about it. They have widely discussed it, but I can’t predict when the European Union will do anything about it. There is pressure from the media and regulators as well. European regulators are quite keen on this. Even the utilities, the electricity distribution companies, are keen on it. In India, we have a very low level of understanding on this particular topic. We do not need to panic. SF6 is good. We are not devilising SF6 here. But we need to consider if we can base our future plans on SF6.

The next step in insulation
We are moving away from oil transformers, especially at the distribution stage. Can we make a big impact by moving to alternate ways of insulation, heat dissipation, etc? SQL is a very good example. We have transformers in our manufacturing factory in Vadodara. It’s quite popular, and is a step towards moving away from oil. The next step is that we can do away with oil. Dry transfer, different types of technologies are there. We have it outside India but not here. We used to make it few years ago. But for some reasons we moved away from it, but we are now taking a second look at it. Hopefully this year, we can move towards better transformers.

Future expansion plans
Schneider is a strong world leader in low voltage and medium voltage, along with the software required for applications near the equipment, which is what we call edge control or, at a longer distance, SCADA. It is not local, but you can send all the information and wait for a few minutes for the artificial intelligence to make a decision. So if we can make our own equipment digitally connectable, the customers will get benefit from it on their cloud. Big customers have their own cloud, so for smaller customers, we give our cloud and data connection. You see a lot of advisor software that is available and this software can provide intelligence and approve it. So the value for the customer is that you reduce the downtime; in fact, you don’t have to wait. You manage your maintenance by doing maintenance now rather than waiting for it to fail. You don’t have to wait in a refinery if we can do this and thereby save downtime. And that’s the value proposition that we are after.

The second part is things like decarbonisation, SF6 greenhouse gases, these are the big value additions that we can give the industry. And when you have decentralised operations, a lot of connections can be managed better.

So, the purpose is not just electrical equipment; they have to be at a mature level to manage a lot of data with security, cybersecurity, etc. So we are positioning ourselves to be at that level of maturity to help customers in this way. Today, the customers are mature, so they do not need training on these aspects. Now, we are equal partners at the same table. If we see something new and if the customers are willing to partner with us, we will give them back some value. And that’s the level of maturity that we are at. The new world of energy at Schneider Electric is this world that also adds to value before deciding parameters or standards.

For more detail, contact:
Ponniah Sankarakumar,
Director, Power Systems,
Schneider Electric India
Website: www.se.com