The next level for the VRDT

Dis­tri­b­u­tion grids are a key ele­ment on the path to a ful­ly elec­tri­fied world. To pre­pare them for the chal­lenges of tomor­row, large-scale use of volt­age reg­u­lat­ed dis­tri­b­u­tion trans­form­ers (VRDTs) is the most effi­cient solu­tion. The third gen­er­a­tion of the ECOTAP® VPD® enables volt­age reg­u­la­tion to become stan­dard in dis­tri­b­u­tion trans­form­ers.

Why VRDTs are becoming ever more important

1 DECENTRALIZED GENERATION

is increas­ing, and with it the need to increase the per­for­mance of dis­tri­b­u­tion grids.

2 ADDITIONAL LOADS

Mobil­i­ty and heat will be elec­tric in the future. The host­ing capac­i­ty for these addi­tion­al loads must increase.

3 DUAL ROLE

With solar sys­tems on roofs, more and more con­sumers are also becom­ing pro­duc­ers. Dis­tri­b­u­tion grids have to dynam­i­cal­ly respond to these dynam­ics.

4 MORE FLEXIBILITY

in sec­tor cou­pling can be uti­lized more effi­cient­ly of dis­tri­b­u­tion grids have greater capac­i­ty.

5 THE COMPLEXITY OF GRIDS IS INCREASING

and the dig­i­tal­iza­tion of dis­tri­b­u­tion grids helps mas­ter this issue.

Simply powerful

The third generation of ECOTAP® VPD® makes voltage regulation the standard in distribution transformers.

500,000 SWITCHING
is what ECOTAP® VPD® is capa­ble of. This exceeds the aver­age ser­vice life time of a typ­i­cal local grid trans­former.

Smart­ly into the future
Thanks to ECOTAP® VPD®, dig­i­tal con­nec­tion is no prob­lem and the VRDT becomes active equip­ment in the dig­i­tal dis­tri­b­u­tion grid.

Very com­pact
The vol­ume of the new ECOTAP® VPD® has been reduced by 50 per­cent in com­par­i­son to its pre­de­ces­sor.

30 %
less weight is what the new ECOTAP® VPD® includ­ing motor-dri­ve unit brings.

Main­te­nance-free oper­a­tion
Vac­u­um tap-change tech­nol­o­gy ensures a long ser­vice life and vir­tu­al­ly no main­te­nance effort.

Auto­mat­ed pro­duc­tion
The new ECOTAP® VPD® was designed for auto­mat­ed pro­duc­tion in high quan­ti­ties. As a result, costs can be reduced sig­nif­i­cant­ly and volt­age reg­u­la­tion can become the stan­dard in dis­tri­b­u­tion grids. Pro­duc­tion takes place in a new­ly con­struct­ed plant in Italy.

 

How does a VRDT work?

New pow­er sup­pli­ers, such as pho­to­volta­ic sys­tems on roofs, lead to volt­age increas­es in local net­works. New loads, such as those caused by e‑mobility, lead to addi­tion­al volt­age drops. Dis­tri­b­u­tion grids to date have not been designed for this. Since medi­um-volt­age and low-volt­age grids are rigid­ly cou­pled via dis­tri­b­u­tion trans­form­ers, the most com­mon option used in the past, was to expand the grid. That is expen­sive! Depend­ing on grid con­di­tions, the host­ing capac­i­ty for addi­tion­al loads and sup­pli­ers can be increased two to four times using a VRDT, with­out need­ing to rein­force the cable net­work. How does this work? The con­trol and reg­u­lat­ing unit 1 con­tin­u­ous­ly mea­sures the sec­ondary volt­age 2 uand auto­mat­i­cal­ly out­puts a sig­nal to the tap chang­er when it needs to change the trans­former ratio 3. The con­trol and reg­u­lat­ing unit can also be con­nect­ed with SCADA sys­tems 4 to sup­port more sophis­ti­cat­ed volt­age con­trol schemes.

 

Where does the ECOTAP® VPD® fit in?

In addition to distribution grids, VRDTs are also suitable for industrial applications and renewable production systems.

 

Distribution grid

The dis­tri­b­u­tion grid is the main appli­ca­tion for the new ECOTAP® VPD® with 30 amperes.It keeps the volt­age in the low volt­age grid sta­ble and is designed for trans­form­ers up to a volt­age class of 24 kV.

 

Industry

If very pre­cise volt­age or a larg­er reg­u­lat­ing range is need­ed, ECOTAP® VPD® with 100 amperes and change-over selec­tor is the right choice. It offers 17 oper­at­ing posi­tions and sup­plies indus­tri­al, agri­cul­tur­al or com­mer­cial process­es with a defined, sta­ble volt­age range, pro­tect­ed against out­side influ­ences.

 

Renewables

At high­er pow­er lev­els but with less space, such as in wind pow­er sys­tems, ECOTAP® VPD® with 100 amperes and 9 oper­at­ing posi­tions is the right on-load tap-chang­er. It can be eas­i­ly inte­grat­ed into exist­ing trans­former design and helps opti­mize

 

 

Technology from the pioneer

Reinhausen has adapted its expertise from several decades of experience with on-load tap-changers to the specific requirements in distribution transformers continuously further developing the solution

  • 2009
    The first pilot projects start

    n ini­tial field tests, tri­als were still con­duct­ed with con­ven­tion­al tap chang­ers in oil tech­nol­o­gy and the effec­tive­ness of volt­age reg­u­lat­ed dis­tri­b­u­tion trans­form­ers was proven in real-world oper­a­tion.

  • 2012
    First series solution for voltage regulated distribution transformers.

    GRIDCON® iTAP® was the first main­te­nance-free, high­ly-com­pact vac­u­um on-load tap-chang­er for dis­tri­b­u­tion trans­form­ers. Rein­hausen devel­oped the sys­tem specif­i­cal­ly for use in dis­tri­b­u­tion grids. The sys­tem con­sists of an on-load tap-chang­er, motor-dri­ve unit and volt­age reg­u­la­tor.

  • 2016
    First high-speed resistor-type tap-changer for distribution transformers

    Rein­hausen launched ECOTAP® VPD® , the world’s first high-speed resis­tor-type tap-chang­er for dis­tri­b­u­tion trans­form­ers with direct dri­ve. It solved the prob­lem of addi­tion­al loss­es in the trans­former.

  • 2018
    The second generation of the ECOTAP® VPD® is brought to market

    It is even more eco­nom­i­cal than its pre­de­ces­sor and is suit­able for a a broad­er range of appli­ca­tions.

 

YOUR CONTACT


Do you have any ques­tions about ECOTAP® VPD® ?
Fran­co Piz­zut­to is here to help:
F.Pizzutto@reinhausen.com

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