INTERNATIONAL POWER SYSTEM CONSULTANTS
power system design services
MPE can provide preliminary & detailed design services for onshore and offshore wind, PV, battery storage, & conventional power plants. This includes substation layout, cable routing & sizing (including thermal analysis), harmonic filter design, earthing design, tender & owner’s engineer support.
wind & PV concept design
MPE can produce high level concept designs for your wind or PV farm including a number of options for turbine size, PV layout, inverter size and location (string or central type), substation location, cable routing etc.
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These concepts can then be used for yield analysis, and also become a basis for subsequent detailed electrical design for costing or tender purposes.
wind & PV yield analysis
For a single site (for energy production), or on a country wide basis (for energy production, capacity credit studies, or reserve optimization), MPE can convert wind or solar irradiation data into power & energy values with associated costs.
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This includes consideration of inverter,
transformer, and cable losses as appropriate.
detailed electrical design
MPE can provide detailed electrical designs suitable for putting out for tender. This includes:
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Substation designs
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Studies to confirm component ratings
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Specification of cables (including required fibre optic and civil works)
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Specification of substation equipment
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Site visit and cable route walk to confirm suitability
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Measurement of cable route with differential GPS
earthing grid design
A well-designed earthing system is important for the safety of both personnel and equipment. MPE can design and evaluate earthing systems to provide a safe and cost-effective installation. Our earthing studies are conducted using state-of-the-art software that is capable of handling small, simple earth grids through to large systems with complex geometries and multi-level soil models. Our services include:
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​measuring soil resistivity and creating soil models
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design and modelling of earth grids
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calculating earth grid resistance, earth potential rise, and step and touch potentials
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earth grid conductor sizing
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carrying out fall-of-potential testing to determine the resistance of installed earth grids
substation layout
MPE can provide substation layouts at a level suitable for initial concept exploration through to detailed design.
We work with outdoor and indoor switchgear, air-insulated and gas-insulated substations, on and offshore, and for medium voltage (MV) through to high voltage (400kV) levels.
offshore wind farm platform design
MPE, together with our experienced offshore fabrication partners, can produce a preliminary design of an offshore substation (electrical, topside, jacket) including rating of equipment and budget estimates.
The design produced is suitable for tender specifications. We can also provide construction supervision to ensure equipment is supplied and installed to specification.
To date, MPE's clients for these activities include 50Hz and ENBW transmission companies in Germany.
reactive power planning
Whether the purpose is for grid code compliance, offshore wind farm export cable compensation, voltage stability improvement, system wide reactive power reserve planning, MPE can appropriately size and specify your reactive dynamic and static reactive power equipment in the most economic way possible while ensuring requirements and voltage stability margins are met.
Also see our project references which showcase our involvement in the OFGEM NIC NGET / UKPN Power Potential project which utilises embedded generation to provide reactive power services to transmission.
harmonic filter design
MPE can assess your project to determine if ​harmonic filtering is required. If so, we can design active or static filtering solutions to mitigate harmonic current emission or resonance issues.
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We can develop concept designs, or detailed filter design including specification of individual filter components considering tolerance for frequency and voltage variation, to a level of detail suitable for tender.
MPE has experience of filter design from MV to HV including HVAC connected offshore wind farms, HVDC systems, transmission and distribution applications.
specification of equipment for tender
A good equipment specification is important to ensure that you get the most cost-effective equipment for your application with no ‘surprises’ after it is received.
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Our philosophy to achieve this is to provide specifications that are clear and concise, providing enough information and requirements to ensure that equipment is suitable for the application while not placing unnecessary restrictions on the vendors which can increase costs without providing any tangible benefit.
We can provide specifications for a range of equipment, including transformers, switchgear, generators, inverters, cables, control equipment and more.
tender support & evaluation
We can provide assistance with:
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identifying suitable contracting methodologies
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preparing tender documentation
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determining evaluation criteria
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answering tenderer questions
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independent technical reviews of proposals
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preparing recommendations for award
cable routing, selection & optimisation
MPE can route and select cables for your application based on technical requirements and cost impact of CAPEX and OPEX of the system. This can range from checking cable ampacity, voltage drop and short-circuit withstand to ensure compliance with applicable codes, through to optimisation of cable sizes based on installed cost, annualised losses for time-varying loads, and calculation of net present value of losses (OPEX) vs. CAPEX.
Our engineers have experience with a range of cable installation methods and voltage levels from LV to HV, and for AC and DC cabling.
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We can deliver desktop and onsite surveys of cable routes using high precision GPS with RTX-correction, and a GIS (Geographic Information System)-software. Crossing of other cables, roads, and gas pipes can be considered, and alternative routes proposed as required.
We have developed an in-house tool for ampacity (temperature) calculations for unconventional cable environments and laying arrangements , e.g. for submarine cables and inhomogeneous cable groups. Our tool has additionally been extended to consider a time varying ampacity calculation. This allows us to assess the ampacity even for load profiles which are not covered by standards, e.g. load profiles of wind or PV farms.
​owner's engineer activities
MPE can act as an owner's engineer, providing independent advice and expertise to ensure the success of your project.
We have a particular specialization in acting as the owner's engineer for renewable energy projects.
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initial concept design and feasibility studies
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site selection and analysis
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preparing technical specifications for engaging main contractors and procuring owner-supplied equipment
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tender support and evaluation
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design reviews
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site support and supervision
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monitoring budget and schedule
site support & supervision
Throughout the construction process, MPE can provide on-site support and supervision. Including:
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inspecting contractor performance
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monitoring progress
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ensuring equipment is to specification and installed correctly
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providing technical direction
battery / storage sizing & site selection
The approach to sizing of storage of any type (battery, flow cell, CAES, pump hydro etc.), depends heavily on the objective of the system to be installed.
Whether it is for system wide reasons (e.g. frequency response, reserve, virtual synchronous machine functionality), or local reasons (e.g. constraint management, variable generation smoothing, voltage support, improvement of synchronous machine transient stability), we can produce the relevant technical and techno-economic studies for cost benefit analysis purposes.
We can also assess the best location in the power system where storage systems can be installed with the least cost, without network restrictions.
let's talk
if you have a question about our services, or would like to talk about how we can help with one of our projects then please use the form below, where all offices will receive your message and the most appropriate person will reply as soon as possible