Hydro Tasmania, a renewable energy business based in Hobart, Tasmania, Austrialia, contributes approximately 60 percent of Australia’s renewable energy through its hydropower developments and wind farms. As part of the King Island Renewable Energy Expansion (KIREX) project, Hydro Tasmania installed two wind turbines to complement the existing wind/diesel power station for King Island, which is located in Bass Strait, between Tasmania and Victoria in the southeast of Australia. The project, designed by Hydro Tasmania Consulting, uses wind turbines from Vestas Wind Systems, in Randers, Denmark.
The power station is load-controlled and fully automatic. The automation system includes a Rockwell Automation Allen-Bradley-brand Programmable Logic Controller (PLC) control system, with an RSView operator interface. Part of the installation of the new wind turbines was Vestas’ proprietary control system, Vestas Online. This package allows remote control of small and large wind farms from a central control point, with control, monitoring and historical functions.
Internally, all communications between the Vestas Server and the turbines is performed using OPC. RSLinx, a Rockwell Software communication server for plant-floor devices, has the capacity to act as an OPC server, so OPC was chosen as the link between the Vestas Server and the Station Controller.
Although the Vestas and controller networks were physically connected, it was not possible to logically link data from the two systems together, due to domain and Distributed Common Object Model (DCOM) issues. After some good experiences during early commissioning of the Vestas network—using a free OPC client utility called MatrikonOPC Explorer, from Matrikon, in Edmonton, Alberta, Canada—Hydro Tasmania Consulting chose the MatrikonOPC Tunneller to provide the bridge between the two networks. Tunneller provides an easy, reliable and effective way to communicate across different network domains, and does away with the headaches typically associated with the configuration of DCOM. The implementation of this software was carried out painlessly.
20 parameters a second
“MatrikonOPC Tunneller was literally plug-and-play,” says Simon van der Aa, Control Systems Engineer with Hydro Tasmania Consulting. “Once we installed it and followed the simple configuration instructions, we haven’t had to touch it. Since it was installed, MatrikonOPC Tunneller has been pretty much transparent.”
Via this OPC connection, the Station Controller can control the wind turbines, allowing them to be integrated seamlessly into the overall station control philosophy. The station is capable of running unmanned, and schedules and loads the generators according to customer loading and wind conditions. The Station Controller can also log many parameters of the station and wind turbine operation, allowing the operators to quickly locate and troubleshoot faults that may occur. Approximately 20 parameters are transferred between the two systems every second.
Hydro Tasmania Consulting provides engineering, scientific and associated services to national and international customers. Clients of Hydro Tasmania Consulting include environmental, electricity, water and other utilities throughout the world, all levels of government in Australia and overseas, project developers, mining companies and multilateral lending agencies such as the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, AusAID and United Nations agencies.
For more information about Matrikon and the OPCTunneller, visit http://www.matrikonopc.com.
