Industrial automation technology and equipment have been widely used in the system composition, function realization, safe operation, optimal dispatching and power quality assurance of new energy power generation, and further promote the development of new energy technology.

As the main energy of industry, whether oil can be regenerated has been discussed by all walks of life. To be sure, oil is not a clean energy. On the one hand, for the protection of environment and ecology, we have to look for clean energy to reduce the damage to nature; On the other hand, oil is directly linked to the US dollar. In today's complex international situation, all countries hope to develop new energy to get rid of their dependence on the US dollar.

China is a big energy consumer, but with the development of social economy, the energy structure has also undergone profound changes. According to statistics, the domestic non fossil energy accounted for 14.3% in 2018, and is expected to reach 15% this year. Among them, hydropower, wind power, solar energy and nuclear power are widely used. Among them, industrial automation technology and equipment have been widely used in the system composition, function realization, safe operation, optimal dispatching and power quality assurance of new energy power generation, and further promote the development of new energy technology.

Application of industrial automation in new energy industry

In the past five years of the new energy industry, stimulated by policies, the cumulative installed capacity of wind power generation and photovoltaic power generation has ranked first in the world. The application of automation technology and equipment in the field of new energy power generation is becoming more and more mature. From 2015 to 2019, the application scale of industrial automation in the new energy industry increased from 96.97 billion to 109.93 billion, with a compound annual growth rate of 3.2%. With the scale of new energy power generation projects increasing year by year, the application of industrial automation in the new energy industry will also usher in a broader space for development.

Automation equipment mainly covers control, drive, execution, feedback and network, including industrial control computer, SCADA system, DCS system, servo frequency converter, sensor, industrial Ethernet, etc. In the field of new energy power generation, automation technology and equipment are mainly used to ensure the normal and safe operation of power system. In addition, they also undertake fault detection, automatic system reconfiguration, intelligent decision-making and other related work.

Taking the automation technology of wind power generation as an example, the automatic control subsystems under the wind turbine include pitch control system, yaw control system and variable current control system. As wind farms are usually distributed in sparsely populated areas with harsh environment, it is difficult to centralize management and the efficiency of manual operation and maintenance is very low. Therefore, automation technology is mainly used for centralized control of electric field regionalization, to collect, monitor, control and optimize the data of each electric field in the region, to ensure the safety, reliability and economy of the wind farm, and to reduce the labor cost of electric field operation.

In the photovoltaic field, the automation system is mainly used for real-time monitoring and control of primary equipment such as the battery array, combiner box, inverter and box type substation of the photovoltaic power station, to realize equipment data collection, analysis, processing, event recording and storage, and to present the operation of the power station through various types of diagrams, trends and reports, so as to monitor the data of the power station in real time.

Intelligent challenge of automation equipment

From the wind power, photovoltaic and other industries, in addition to the operation control of the wind turbine body, the application of automation technology in the new energy industry mainly focuses on the maintenance and detection of equipment. No matter the wind farm or photovoltaic power generation, once the equipment fails, it will affect the normal operation of the whole unit system, resulting in the interruption of the overall service of the system. The main reason for the system failure is that it is caused by operation error. Therefore, the value of automation equipment in the new energy industry reflects both reliability and labor cost.

The control system is very important for the detection, control and optimization of power station operation. Wind direction and speed sensor, rotation angle sensor, vibration sensor, temperature sensor and other equipment are widely used in the new energy industry. With the closer integration of industrialization and informatization, the control system technology of new energy power generation, as the core of the automatic control layer, is facing this intelligent challenge.

At present, the detection and protection of wind turbines put forward new requirements for automation technology and equipment. Such as detection and control of vibration and deformation of the unit, detection and protection of corrosion of offshore fans, etc. The future new energy industry needs the control system to have more accurate detection capability, stronger data analysis capability and data transmission capability with the help of intelligent platforms such as industrial cloud platform and big data platform.

Automation market outlet of new energy industry

In general, with the continuous maturity of automation technology, the automatic control system not only meets the needs of active control, but also optimizes the development of passive control. Beijing Sifang, Guodian Nari and other enterprises have gradually developed their own power automation systems through absorption and research after introducing Siemens and ABB brand systems in the early stage.

In the subdivided fields, in the new energy industry, automation enterprises, as equipment suppliers, provide core components for new energy enterprises. In recent years, wind power and photovoltaic power generation projects usually adopt the EPC general contracting management mode, namely "engineering design procurement construction general contracting mode" Taking wind power as an example, the wind power developer selects the complete wind power manufacturer through bidding. The complete wind power manufacturer is responsible for the whole process of engineering design, procurement and construction, including automation technology and equipment. In actual operation, the manufacturer of wind turbine sets conducts overall system integration by purchasing control systems, sensors, connectors, high-power servo converters and other equipment from automation enterprises.

As a component supplier of wind turbine manufacturers, it is particularly critical for automation enterprises to cultivate in the subdivision field. Both wind power and photovoltaic power fields are located in sparsely populated areas, even in places with poor environment. For example, the northwest of China, the uninhabited islands along the coast, and so on. In this special environment, the automation equipment needs to have the functions of wind and sand resistance, high temperature resistance, corrosion resistance and so on. Therefore, the components provided by automation enterprises should not only have the characteristics of high efficiency and long life, but also provide corresponding solutions according to the special environment on site.

epilogue

To develop new energy sources, there are both environmental protection factors and international environmental factors. It is worth affirming that the development of new energy industry is the general trend. However, although the domestic automation technology is basically mature, it still can not well meet the practical application. The subject of intelligent automation equipment in the new energy industry still needs further research.

Insiders pointed out that, first of all, after more than ten years of development of domestic automation technology, the equipment failure rate is below 5%, and the operation stability is high; Secondly, in the wind power and photovoltaic industries, automation equipment is more of an auxiliary equipment, which plays an important role in improving the power generation rate and monitoring the operation of power plants; Thirdly, to meet the high-efficiency operation of new energy electric fields, the exploration of industrial cloud, big data, artificial intelligence and traditional automation is the future market outlet of automation in the new energy industry.