The great power's weapons are in place! How powerful is the world’s largest capacity “power heart”?

During the "15th Five-Year Plan" period, my country will invest more than 5 trillion yuan in building new power grids. How to build a new power grid? What technical problems need to be overcome? Just a few days ago, a flexible DC transformer with the world's largest capacity was put into place in the center of Guangzhou city.

The world’s largest capacity “electric heart”

Construction will not stop during holidays

Headquarters reporter Zhao Jing: I am at the construction site of the 220 kV Tianhe Tangxia flexible back-to-back project in Guangzhou. The white "big thing" that the workers are installing is the world's largest-capacity flexible DC transformer that was put in place just a few days ago and is also the "heart" of the entire project. Its capacity is 770 megavolt-amperes. Calculated, it can drive about 100,000 electric vehicles to slow charge at the same time. During the National Day holiday, there were still more than 450 builders working on site in shifts.

What difficulties do you have to go through to overcome the difficulties?

Overcoming the first hurdle

"Electric power interchange" connects three large areas

Why build this project in Guangzhou? The picture above shows the three major power supply areas in the core of Guangzhou: Kapok Area, Zengcheng Area, and Guangnan Area. In the past, the ability of these three areas to regulate power supply to each other was weak. Think of these three areas as three reservoirs. If the Kapok area is short of water, water must be transferred from the other two areas immediately. Multiple valves need to be opened to create a water level difference, so that the water flow can be adjusted to support the Kapok area. The adjustment process may take a long time, and may also cause a large number of power outages in the Kapok area due to untimely adjustment. Therefore, there is an urgent need in Guangzhou for a master valve that can be flexibly adjusted.

How to achieve flexible regulation of the three areas? The core is flexible DC technology, which is equivalent to building a new "intelligent water gate + two-way pumping station" controller between three reservoirs. Once there is a water shortage in a certain area, this device can send water from the other two areas to provide support within milliseconds. If the water flow is too large, the valve will be closed immediately to avoid affecting the surrounding area.

Overcoming the second difficulty

Where is the best place to place the "main valve"?

This project is located in the center of Guangzhou, the best location being equidistant from the three major power supply areas in Guangzhou. However, land here is at a premium, so the construction team innovatively adopted the equipment upstairs mode. The entire converter station is 49 meters high, making it the highest land-based flexible DC converter station in China. After the project is completed, the new power supply capacity will be able to meet the electricity needs of approximately 350,000 households.

Overcoming the third difficulty

Quiet the "electric heart"

When the transformer is running, special noise of 100 to 400 Hz will be generated. To solve this problem, the R&D team specially developed a noise reduction device.

The surface of the cover plate in the picture is covered with holes. If it is attached to the wall around the transformer, after the sound waves enter, they will resonate repeatedly and cancel each other out, thereby reducing the noise. According to calculations, this device can reduce the noise of the transformer by 80% to 90%.

From using electricity to using good electricity and using green electricity

This project, from core components to supporting equipment, is all domestically produced, allowing people to move from using electricity to using good electricity and using green electricity. In the future, transformer substations, Beidou base stations, energy storage stations, etc. will be concentrated here to build the largest "multi-station-in-one" park in China, where new power grid construction will promote the coordinated development of the "six networks."