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SES has developed the most powerful grounding / earthing software packages that can automatically design an entire grounding site located in multilayered soil. The packages are accurate, efficient, reliable and most of all, validated extensively with verifiable resullts published in the most reputable scientific journals. Yet, despite their unique and poweful capabilities, these packages are affordable and can be customized to meet your most challenging problems as well as your tighest budgets. |
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AutoGroundDesign The AutoGroundDesign engineering tool offers powerful and intelligent functions that help electrical engineers design safe grounding installations quickly and efficiently. A two-step approach is used for the automated grounding system design. The grid database is, optionally, the starting point of any automated design and will cover most grids that are encountered in practice. Next, the initial design is refined recursively using rule-based techniques and algorithms to improve its performance and meet safety constraints, while reducing the overall cost of the grid. Extensive collections of predefined grids have been analyzed, constructed and can be easily updated by the user. A strategy has been devised to quickly find an appropriate grid, while at the same time minimizing the size of the database. The time devoted to design a safe and cost-effective grounding grid is minimized by the use of such automation techniques and appropriate databases. |
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Introduction The design of grounding systems is often based on rough guidelines, derived from engineering experience. It is frequently a trial-and-error procedure and can be quite time-consuming, since it is too difficult to account for the large number of variables (geometrical proportions of the grid, its depth, the nature of the soil and of the grid’s conductors, whether or not grounding rods are attached to the grid, etc…) that can affect the grid’s performance. The ultimate objective of AutoGroundDesign is to use a database and rule-based automated grounding system design method to meet design requirements (such as ground potential rise, touch voltage, step voltage, and ground resistance limits), given the soil structure, dimensions of the grid area, characteristics of conductors, configuration of the grid, and fault current discharged by the grid. Features The 2004 release version of AutoGroundDesign has the following unique features:
For more information information on AutoGroundDesign and its development history proceed to this page. Automated Grounding System Design Structure The automated grounding system design software integrates the following modules and has a structure shown below. |
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Automated Grounding Design Central Module This core and controlling module has a simple interface that allows a user to establish an automated grounding system design quickly and efficiently. The ultimate objective of this module is to manage and coordinate input data, safety criteria and progress decisions in order to obtain a grid design that meets all requirements. The overall automated design parameters are controlled by this module to select the methodology used to obtain the initial design of the grounding systems, specify which grid database methodology is to be used for the automated design, and specify the maximum number of design iterations as well as the rate at which the design of the grid evolves. Grounding Analysis Module This module is used to analyze power system ground networks subjected to AC or DC power frequency currents discharged into various soil structures. It computes the safety performance of the grounding grid, in terms of GPR, touch and step voltages. Since it is assumed that the grid is an equipotential structure, the locations of the current injection points within the ground network do not play a significant role, i.e. the longitudinal impedances of the ground conductors can be neglected. Soil Analysis Module This module is dedicated to the development of equivalent earth structure models based on measured soil resistivity data. It can generate models with many horizontal layers, as well as vertically and exponentially layered soil models. Fault Current Distribution Analysis Module This module calculates the fault current distribution in multiple terminals, transmission lines and distribution feeders using minimum information and a simple set of data concerning the network. It provides the actual fault current flowing into a grounding grid, as well as currents in the shield wires, tower structures and cable sheaths. Self and mutual impedances of the shield wires and cable sheaths are also computed and available. Safety Module This module generates safety threshold values based on IEEE Standard 80, IEC Standard 479, user’s own standard or a hybrid combination of these standards. The computed safety voltage limits are used to decide whether to stop or continue the design process. The parameters to determine the safety voltage limits are: fault clearing time, earth surface covering layer (e.g., crushed rock) resistivity, earth surface covering layer thickness, equivalent subsurface layer resistivity (this is the resistivity of the soil beneath the earth surface covering layer), body resistance, optionally specified foot resistance and resistance of protective wear, such as gloves or boots, and fibrillation current threshold computation method. View, Plot and Report Tools A CAD-based module is used to view or edit three-dimensional grounding grids consisting of straight-line segments. The line segments represent either metallic conductors or observation profiles. They can be viewed from any direction, in a variety of ways. Another report and graphics module serves as a powerful output processor to display the computation results in various graphical or print formats. This module also has the capability to view the input data and even launch the grounding analysis module. Read More... Note: The Soil Analysis Module and Fault Current Distribution modules are presently stand-alone modules. They will be integrated into the AutoGroundDesign package in the next update. |