AUTOMATED MAINTENANCE OF PROTECTION SYSTEMS (AMPS) CHALLENGE
Make power systems more reliable by automating maintenance testing of protective relays and associated potential and current transformers.
IMPORTANT: PLEASE READ THE FULL CHALLENGE BRIEF THAT CONTAINS ALL THE CHALLENGE AND SUBMISSION REQUIREMENTS AND RULES (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1KmqQgIrKE0BiebPjo5O9snN6w-FiDzfx/view?usp=sharing)
***We held our first Webinar April 7th, 2021 1PM-2PM PT/4-5PM ET to learn more about what Reclamation seeks from the solutions. The Webinar was a great opportunity to get clarifications on the contest. If you missed it, or want a refresher, here is a link to the recorded session: https://bit.ly/3wIBaZY
PHASE 1: WHITE PAPER CHALLENGE
Can you help further Reclamation’s mission to protect their hydroelectric plants? Do you want to work on a big infrastructure problem? This Challenge gives you the opportunity to improve the safety and reliability of hydroelectric powerplants and to win your share of the $250,000 prize purse.
To participate, you will need to create a prototype that automates maintenance testing of the plants’ protection systems. Your solution will improve the safety and reliability of the plants, keep the energy flowing while the tests are run, and allow engineers and operators more time to address other important issues.
Up to 10 solutions will win $10,000 and will move forward to phase 2
CHALLENGE OVERVIEW
The Bureau of Reclamation (Reclamation) is looking for solutions to automate comprehensive testing of the existing protection system at hydropower facilities. This $250,000 Challenge seeks prototypes that automate protection systems testing without requiring plants to be off-line and that are not labor intensive. While there can be a variety of approaches to solve this challenge including a single tool, a group of tools, a continuous monitoring system, or a surveillance system, all solutions must result in a decrease in the employee time required for testing, an elimination of plant downtime for testing, and an increase in plant safety and reliability. Solving this challenge will increase hydropower plant generation reliability and avoid the opportunity cost of unit outages. The solutions are being requested by Reclamation for their hydropower facilities however, solutions will likely be applicable to many other protective relay systems.
Reclamation is the largest wholesale water supplier in the United States, operating 53 hydroelectric powerplants that produced 40 billion kilowatt-hours, on average, annually for the last 10 years. After the 2003 Blackout, a comprehensive list of testing protocols was developed and designed to prevent another large power outage. The results are included in the North American Electric Reliability Corporation Protection and Control (NERC PRC) regulatory standards which outlines key activities required to achieve basic utility reliability. NERC PRC-005-6 (https://www.nerc.com/pa/Stand/Reliability%20Standards/PRC-005-6.pdf) , Protection System, Automatic Reclosing, and Sudden Pressure Relaying Maintenance includes the required testing and maintenance protocols related to this challenge. The current testing protocols are labor-intensive and often require the plant to be off-line; however, the NERC protection system maintenance standard allows for most of the maintenance activities to be automated and, with the extensive adoption of microprocessor-based relays, this automation is possible.
The AMPS Challenge will have two phases, a White Paper Challenge, and a Prototype Challenge. The Challenge will last fourteen months from the White Paper Challenge launch to the final Prototype Challenge award. Solvers will have 5.5 months to deliver a White Paper submission describing their technical approach to the problem. Up to ten solutions will receive an award of $10,000 to move forward in the Prototype Challenge. Solvers will then have 5 months to complete their prototype. Preliminary judging of the teams’ written and video submission will be used to select up to five prototypes for testing by Reclamation at a partner facility in Colorado, USA. Selected teams will ship their prototypes, at Reclamation’s expense, along with all supporting materials to the testing site. These prototypes will be tested for the ability to solve the challenge, ease of use and set-up, and ability to address additional tests and features. One winning prototype will be awarded up to $100,000. Additionally, individual Benchmark Awards of up to $10,000 each will be awarded to prototypes that excel in specified performance areas. Winning teams will also have a potential opportunity for a Cooperative Research and Development Agreement or other technology transfer agreement to further refine the solution. Winners are planned to be announced on July 11, 2022.
PHASE 1 – WHITE PAPER CHALLENGE
Submissions for the White Paper Challenge must demonstrate your understanding of the problem space, your understanding of interface requirements and protocols needed to communicate with various manufactured relays and meters, your ability to complete a prototype, verification testing, interface tests with various relays, and your approach. Submissions will be PDFs uploaded to the Challenge site.
The submission must detail:
– Proposed hardware to be used.
– Hardware schematics.
– Operation of the hardware.
– Programming code language.
– Program logic diagrams.
– Sample of proposed output reports.
– Text descriptions and datasheets for proposed solutions of required elements.
– Text descriptions and datasheets for any variations on the solution and for any additional tests included in the solution.
– Demonstration of solvers ability/skill to complete a prototype.
Awards:- This Challenge gives you the opportunity to improve the safety and reliability of hydroelectric powerplants and to win your share of the $250,000 prize purse.
Deadline:- 03-09-2021
