ABB has won an order worth approximately €270 million (some $287.5 million) from the UK grid operator National Grid and Réseau de Transport d’Electricité (RTE), the French network owner and operator, to provide HVDC technology that will help interconnect the electricity networks of France and the UK.
ABB will participate in the interconnection project, which further integrates the UK and French electricity markets. With a capacity of 1,000 megawatts, the link will run from Chilling, Hampshire, on the southern coast of England to Tourbe in northern France, covering a distance of 240 kilometers across the English Channel.
ABB will provide the two high-voltage direct current HVDC Light converter stations, to be located in France and England, which will be linked with a subsea cable. Each station converts alternating current into direct current, and then back again before distribution.
“This order further strengthens our leading HVDC position and provides momentum to our transformational drive for profitable growth, as a partner of choice for enabling a stronger, smarter and greener grid,” said Claudio Facchin , president of ABB’s Power Grids division.
The converter stations will be equipped with ABB’s MACH TM control and protection system, supporting the company’s ABB Ability TM based digital offering. MACH acts like the brain of the HVDC link – monitoring, controlling and protecting the sophisticated technology in the stations, managing thousands of operations to ensure the reliability of power supplies. Incorporating advanced fault registration and remote control functions, it also helps protect the link from unexpected disruptions, such as lightning strikes.