Background
National Grid is an energy company operating in the UK and US. We deliver electricity safely, reliably, and efficiently to the customers and communities we serve – all while working towards a clean energy future.
Our business areas play a vital role in connecting millions of people to the energy they use, while continually seeking ways to make the energy system cleaner. National Grid allows innovation to help revolutionise and decarbonise the future of energy.
National Grid Electricity Transmission (NGET) is responsible for owning and maintaining the high voltage electricity network in England and Wales.
We take electricity generated from windfarms and other power sources and transport it through our network of pylons, overhead lines, cables, and substations. It then goes on to separate lower voltage local distribution networks, which connect directly to homes and businesses. Every time a phone is plugged in, or a switch is turned on, we’ve played a part, connecting you to the electricity you need.
We're investing for the future, connecting more and more low carbon electricity to our network - it’s a crucial role and pivotal in turning the UK’s net zero ambitions into reality whilst ensuring our transmission system remains sustainable.
Now, an innovation opportunity has arisen within the Network Resilience team whose work is to improve the networks reliability, resilience and adaptability during a time of change.
As we support the transition to Net Zero through the development and operation of critical infrastructure, the team is focussed on monitoring and safeguarding the resilience of the network. The in-house interface -Power BI Desktop supports with this to monitor the health and compliance of network assets. This is a challenging task considering not only the dynamic nature of the network but also the vast points of concern.
Challenge
The electricity network is expanding and is becoming more closely integrated. Understanding location and spread of network resilience risk, control performance monitoring, overall and granular network health and problem/escalating risk is key. Moreso, how this analysis will impact the transmission system allows us to make better decisions based on available metrics.
National Grid are seeking innovative solutions to improve electricity network resilience risk reporting, analysis and visualising.
The technical areas that we are interested in include:
- Delayed Auto Reclose (DAR)
- Disconnectors
- Winter Resilience
- Identify priority sites based on certain criteria such as:
- Geographical Location
- Network Location
- Generation
- High demand
- Sensitive Demand
- Energy Not Supplied
- Impact of weather events on the Network
- Impact of the environment on resilience
- For example: temperature and Oil, SF6:
- Healthy levels,
- top-up frequency
- Asset Technical Operations
- Metering
- Predict failure
National Grid ask that all applications include supporting documents.
What's in it for you?
A successful collaboration could mean, for individuals, becoming part of the wider National Grid group, while for organisations, forming a potential partnership with one of the world’s most iconic brands to co-develop and co-launch the idea to market.
These are global challenges and National Grid are willing to collaborate with both individuals/freelancers and other industry participants/universities etc. and solutions can be at any stage of development.
If you have or are developing solutions, or if you have expertise in the above, please click "Apply" to submit your solution/expertise to the Network.