Prysmian Group, world leader in the energy and telecom cable systems industry, has been awarded a contract by National Grid – international electricity and gas company based in the UK and north eastern US – for the supply of Pry-Cam products for on-line condition assessment and hand held diagnostic evaluation.

The contract includes the supply of 15 Pry-Cam Portable units and 6 Pry-Cam Grids units that will be used as a trial for on-line condition assessment and monitoring on the transmission network in England and Wales. This contract follows on from a large permanent PD monitoring system that was awarded to Prysmian in 2014, which consisted of 23 Pry-Cam Grids and 200 Pry-Cam Wings sensors to monitor a strategic 400 kV oil filled cable system. This latest award is the culmination of a 3-year relationship built on a common vision of Asset Management based on Pry-Cam technologies.

Pry-Cam is the Group’s exclusive and revolutionary technology for condition assessment and asset management that allows on-line, accurate and reliable Partial Discharge measurements, diagnosis and defect localization, in order to get in-depth information on assets’ conditions and helps assets owners to increase uptime, asset longevity and safety, while reducing maintenance costs and risks. It is a completely new way to measure the condition of energy network components so that the network or its components can be operational during the measuring. Therefore, the need for maintenance or repair can be found well in advance, and the expensive breakdowns can be avoided.

Pry-Cam Portable is a wireless device for automatic acquisition, processing and classification of Partial Discharges signals. It acquires the electro-magnetic field produced by every single PD pulse without service interruption. Pry-Cam Grids is a high-performance system for automatic acquisition, processing and classification of PD signals and spot temperature measurements. It is designed for long term remote monitoring of 3-phase strategic assets and can be installed within existing operating assets: fast, accurate and effective as no other system before.

“This is the first large-scale supply of Pry-Cam Portable and Grids to a major TSO, who are considered to be a technology leader in terms of Asset Management and confirms the strength of our vision about asset management” stated Roberto Candela, CEO of Prysmian Electronics, the Group’s start-up business specialised in Asset Management Products and Services. “Our customers – not only TSO’s but also asset intensive industry operators like power generators, O&G and other industrial end users – can finally exploit real time PD testing for condition assessment, monitoring and predictive maintenance. This paves the way to new horizons in the world of electrical asset management”, he added.

“In 2014 we found National Grid to have a shared vision of asset management. They had already started to measure and monitor several key operational parameters on their systems to predict and prevent asset failures. Now they are looking to integrate PD measurement in their strategy to understand the performance of their assets and to prevent failures. The match of our vision created several opportunities, first for Pry-Cam PD services and then for Pry-Cam products,” stated Richard Lewis, Commercial Manager of HV Network Components, Prysmian UK.

A journey is just started and this contract does not only confirm National Grid’s appreciation of the potential of Pry-Cam world leading technologies, but it also underlines the increasing attention gathered by Pry-Cam over the recent months throughout Europe.

As a matter of fact, on the occasion of the Jyväskylä Sähkö Tele Valo AV exhibition which took place in Finland last February 3 to 5 – Pry-Cam Grids – the high-performance asset management system for automatic acquisition, processing and classification of PD signals and spot temperature measurement – was awarded acknowledgement as Innovative Product 2016.

The award jury was looking for an innovative product that could be considered as “Internet of Things” (IoT) and that showed outstanding properties, to be different from products already on the market, and to create consequential added value to the customer.

“Pry-Cam Grids collects data independently from PD sensors, warns about problems, can be controlled from a distance and collects data to be analysed via internet; it is indeed an illustration of ‘IoT‘”, stated Olli Anttonen, Sales Director Prysmian Group Finland. “We believe this award is very important also because it helps supporting our business in Pry-Cam services in Finland and making us even more interesting in our field”, he added.

The award was given to Pry-Cam Grids as the most innovative product representing “IoT” and is a clear evidence of the Group’s reputation as an innovative company with state-of-the-art products.