To ensure operational excellence and generation availability within the required minimum standards, it is essential that concession-holding companies adopt measures related to asset management.
Impacts of Asset Management on the Efficiency of the Brazilian Electrical Sector
The adoption of good asset management is essential for concession-holding companies. They, in turn, must strive to maintain operational excellence and ensure generation availability according to minimum required standards.
Furthermore, the rapid growth of the transmission system in the regulated market demands the use of new technologies to efficiently and robustly deal with expansion in both extension and complexity.
There is also a lack of adequate monitoring of assets and their real conditions, resulting in short, medium, or long-term failures, compromising the lifespan of equipment and generating high costs of corrective maintenance, as well as significant losses caused by operational interruptions.
It is worth noting that the Brazil's National Electric Energy Agency (ANEEL) plays a fundamental role in regulating and overseeing the generation, transmission, and distribution of electric energy, establishing a concession-based structure involving high regulation based on pre-established policies and guidelines (Freitas Filho, 2020).
Challenges for Implementing Asset Management
According to the British Standard Institution's specification PAS-55, an asset management plan establishes activities to achieve the defined strategy and objectives throughout the equipment's lifecycle, including acquisition, operation, maintenance, and decommissioning.
However, although national transmission companies have asset management policies based on event history or instant information, these policies do not cover the majority of present equipment.
As a result, as equipment ages without proper monitoring, recurrent failures can occur, interrupting service and requiring costly emergency maintenance.
In addition to physical and natural causes related to equipment degradation, there are functional factors, such as obsolescence and inadequacy, resulting from the emergence of equipment with new technologies.
Thus, the decision to refurbish or replace an asset is based on equipment condition indicators, which require a management system that integrates information and allows for maintenance cost reduction and better asset utilization, resulting in operational improvement.
Adoption of Efficient Asset Management and Overcoming Challenges
Facing difficulties in implementing and integrating a complete asset management system, achieving optimal control of equipment conditions present in multiple lines and substations remains a goal to be achieved.
According to (Zampolli, 2012), a survey conducted in 30 companies and 6 regulatory agencies found that few companies have a clear strategy and an official plan for asset replacement, renewal, or reinforcement capable of providing the required reliability while generating the expected profitability and profitability for shareholders.
Difficulties in accessing the implementation of inefficient integrated systems contribute to this situation, resulting in incorrect maintenance planning.
On the other hand, this same survey found that some companies already practice it and present greater mastery of risk management at each level (strategic, tactical, and operational), as well as the ability to demonstrate to regulatory agencies: structured, highly reliable and quality systems that can outperform market performance requirements.
Technology, Measurement, and Monitoring as Solutions
Online monitoring techniques have been adopted as the main tool for obtaining information from the monitored system or equipment without jeopardizing safe operation and reliability, allowing knowledge of its condition during operation, as well as being able to diagnose any non-conformities.
In this sense, migrating from preventive maintenance to predictive maintenance and from time-based maintenance to maintenance based on the real state of the asset is necessary.
The losses resulting from power interruptions reinforce the need for implementing processes and tools that can assess asset conditions and diagnose them predictively and safely.
Problem Definition
Aged assets;
Untimely shutdowns;
Difficulty diagnosing premature failure in the field;
Decision support is associated with specialized laboratories and consequently, there is an overload of activities or lethargy in the decision-making process.
Caused by:
Old concessions without asset replacement;
Increased likelihood of failures with aging of insulators (dielectrics);
Drying out of sealing structures and penetration of moisture;
Natural wear from operation and transient overvoltages;
Expansion of lines and substations with changes in standardization;
Lack of assertive diagnostic tools in the field, associated with a tested methodology;
Measurement errors.
Culminating in Consequences:
Loss of transmission company revenue and payment of variable portion;
High cost of replacing asset families;
Poor quality of energy transmission service;
Complexity in dealing with suppliers with premature failure assets;
Difficulty in managing in an orderly manner for decision-making and reducing the variable portion.
Methodology Combined with Technology
Thus, even with the modernization of the installed park, the need for conclusive, non-invasive diagnosis is essential to reduce untimely failures, that is, new equipment means new failure modes.
It is also emphasized that the methodologies and periodicity defined by ANEEL are outdated compared to the best management practices and resource utilization.
However, there is no computational tool that covers the specificities of concessionaires and procedures for the concession area. That is, it is not just about new equipment or technologies, but rather a methodology applied with equipment.
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