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Client Story

ENEL/ENDESA, Spain

The Enel Group (including Endesa organisations across Europe and Latin America), is made up of nearly 70,000 people from around the world whose work is based on core values of Responsibility, Innovation, Trust and Proactivity. ENEL’s portfolio of power stations is highly diversified including, hydroelectric, wind, geothermal, solar, thermoelectric, nuclear and other renewable sources of power. Almost half of the energy generated by Enel is produced with zero carbon dioxide emissions, making the group one of the leading producers of clean energy.

Enel Spain’s requirement was for an advanced telecontrol system based on open standards, that must be robust to deliver a reliable communications platform that would provide connectivity for Distribution automation across some very challenging territories both geographically and from a human perspective.

ENEL/ENDESA, Spain

Situation

Due to the variety of regulatory environments in which Enel operate, the successful solution needed to operate within existing 12.5khz frequency allocations in the VHF and UHF bands, depending on the country of use. Due to the legacy of the deployed Distribution Automation solutions across the various Enel Distribution companies, multiple Data standards including IEC101, 103 and DNP3 were required along with open standards based, over-the-air communications. The solution also needed to be scalable from 1 or 2 sites to over 150 sites due to the varying demands of Distribution companies within the group.

The solution required efficient bandwidth management by optimizing available spectrum, maximum resilience and security assurance through authentication, encryption and message integrity controls. The SCADA systems required support for IEC-101 and IEC-104, protocols to Remote Terminal Units supporting serial RS-232 and Ethernet.

Response

Tait proposed DMR Tier 3, a market-leading, open standards based 12.5khz communications solution, which can operate in a wide range of globally applicable VHF and UHF frequencies. For SCADA telemetry, Tait proposed its centralised GridLink SCADA gateway interfacing to SCADA master systems to provide translation and management for DNP3 and IEC protocols for transmission over DMR. The endpoints proposed were Tait TD9300 GridLink terminals providing DNP3 and IEC protocols over serial and Ethernet/IP to Remote Terminal Units.

The Tait solution enabled a single form factor and uniform management interfaces across the Distribution companies within the Enel Group, whilst accommodating legacy frequencies and Distribution systems. The benefits of a Tait solution for Enel included;

  • Implementation of a DMR tier 3 open standard ETSI trunked network with 153 sites in Spain that is easily scalable with over 8,000 GridLink data terminals expandable to up to 50,000 terminals,
  • Maximum security utilising AES 256 encryption with OTAP and network monitoring tools,
  • Remote management and diagnostics facilities that allow console access from the Control Centre to remotely configure the GridLink terminals
  • Extensive system monitoring tool for managing system load and traffic parameters,
  • Transparent support of SCADA communications standards: DNP3 over TCP/IP and serial, IEC60870-5-101 and 104,
  • Tait EnableFleet management tool to enable remote configuration and firmware management of all GridLink terminals over the network,
  • Expansion to voice services over the DMR Tier 3 system on the same infrastructure that will include Tait portable and mobile terminals, PTToC and TAIT AXIOM Mobiles,
  • Tait Support Services providing remote analysis, diagnostics and remediation services for Enel’s communications infrastructure.

Outcomes

After a robust and extensive evaluation, Enel enabled their Distribution Companies in Spain Peru, Colombia, Brazil and Chile to take advantage of Tait Gridlink. Deployment throughout the Enel Group has been ongoing since 2014. At the time of writing, over 10,000 GridLink terminals have been deployed supported by 300 radio sites in five countries, with an additional 5,000 GridLink terminals to be ordered.

With the implementation of the Tait DMR3 SCADA GridLink solution ENEL has achieved their targeted goal for improved grid reliability and resilience to over 99% and has improved the service quality to their customers whilst reducing operational costs through better visibility of and remote access to endpoints.

Expansion of their current data services is in progress and continues over the next two years with thousands of additional GridLink devices to be added.

The DMR tier 3 network enables the addition of voice services at marginal cost. This is planned for next year, and will further enhance the productivity and safety of field personnel, especially lone workers.

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