Edison, N.J., August 15, 2003—Dranetz-BMI, a leading provider of power monitoring instrumentation has successfully captured the power events leading up to and following Thursday's power failure that brought down the electric grid in the Northeastern United States Canada.
This waveform data was captured by Dranetz-BMI's Signature SystemTM, a next generation monitoring platform that relies on a web browser as the user interface and features scalability and extended analytical capabilities.
The following data was recorded at the service entrance of Dranetz-BMI's manufacturing facility in Edison, N.J.. This facility experienced the disturbance that resulted in the largest blackout in North America on August 14, 2003 at 4:10PM EDT. The initial disturbance was not very dramatic, but was an indication of things that happened in rapid succession afterwards.
The first sag, or drop in voltage, as the system starts to be overloaded
Three seconds later, a 2nd deeper sag occurs, down to half of the original voltage levels, as the grid collapses in the Northeast. This is followed by a slight recovery over the next four seconds, before a third sag, though less severe than the second, occurs. After this, it appears that the tie lines opened to isolate the local grid from collapsing sections, as the voltage begins to recover.
As it recovers, the voltage actually goes higher than normal, or swells, as the system tries to stabilize. This abnormally high recovery period lasts for 10 seconds, before the distribution system re-establishes a more normal voltage level.
Graphics of the first four seconds of the event show the initial sags and recovery.
The frequency normally ranges between 60.005 and 59.995 Hz. After the sag, the frequency increases to over 60.3 Hz in Edison, and throughout the grid, as shown in Knoxville, Tenn., home to Dranetz-BMI sister company Electrotek Concepts.
Frequency in Edison
Frequency in Knoxville
The voltage drop was seen throughout the New York City metropolitan area, as is illustrated in this measurement taken from a monitoring site in Staten Island.
As the power is restored throughout the Northeast, companies must carefully energize process equipment to ensure a seamless reactivation without causing costly damage. For example, restarting motors and adjustable speed drives typically requires 6 to 10 times the normal amount of electricity during the activation or inrush period. Power monitoring instrumentation will be used by many companies to bring their processes back on line without causing power quality problems.
"Among Dranetz-BMI's base of 20,000 customers are many of the utilities, agencies, and institutions impacted by the blackout, including Consolidated Edison, Public Service Electric & Gas, Niagara Mohawk, United Illuminating, New York City Transit Authority, the Federal Aviation Administration, and many leading Wall Street financial institutions," said Joseph I. Gonzalez Rivas, President and CEO of WPT, Inc. parent company of Dranetz-BMI. "We are providing this information and have made our technical support and engineering staff available to assist any customer impacted by this unfortunate event."
The Signature System was developed by Dranetz-BMI and Electrotek Concepts, subsidiaries of WPT Inc. Dranetz-BMI has been a pioneer in power quality instrumentation for more than 30 years, engineering and manufacturing a range of handheld, portable and permanently installed power quality and energy management tools for utility, industrial, facility and electrical contractor customers. Electrotek Concepts is a widely recognized leader in engineering, software development and consulting services for utility and industrial power systems, energy management, renewable energy and distributed generation.
For additional information, contact:
Ellen Leinfuss
Vice President, Marketing
WPT Inc.
732-248-4482
eleinfuss@wptinc.com