The smarts behind our network
Like a musical conductor guiding the orchestra, our team of engineers and network controllers direct the electricity flow through the network.
Like a musical conductor guiding the orchestra, our team of engineers and network controllers direct the electricity flow through the network, creating a balance and harmony that is essential to a steady power supply.
Western Power – like all electricity networks in Australia – maintains current power system frequency of 50Hz and voltages within limits. It’s the frequency and voltages our homes, businesses and appliances are built to work within.
It’s a strict balance of electricity generation and customer demand that must be constantly maintained –too high or low could cause appliances and other electrical equipment to not perform as well, or even fail.
Nobody wants that.
The good news is our team works behind the scenes 24/7 to maintain the voltages and a steady 50Hz stream from the generator to you – increasing and decreasing as required.
When we need to direct more energy into areas where demand is expected to increase, like towards a stadium when a big concert is on, we’re on top of it.
When there is a fault on the line and customers lose power, it’s these same smarts that enable to us to redirect power to properties around the fault to minimise the number of people without power. We call this backfeeding.
It’s the important work that goes on behind the scenes – all in the name of maintaining network harmony.
Managing large energy users
We have an agreement with large consumers of electricity to scale back their electricity consumption at times of peak network usage.
Our demand side management scheme gives us greater control of how power is used throughout the state.
By working closely with our largest customers we can manage the peaks to keep the network operating efficiently.
Predicting the sun
We are working with the Australian National University on research into solar forecasting.
This is a process that uses advanced modelling of network-wide data to forecast solar output.
Twenty per cent of Western Australian homes have solar panels and having advanced knowledge about how much solar power is being fed into the grid will help us meet the ongoing power needs of the state.
Posted 26 March 2020