ENAC has recently granted accreditation to Laboratorio Central Oficial de Electrotecnia, LCOE, to carry out two new calibration activities related to high voltage, specifically, systems for measuring lightning pulses and high-voltage standard capacitors, becoming the first laboratory in Spain to be accredited for this purpose.

The first of these two activities the LCOE has obtained ENAC accreditation for, calibration of chopped lightning pulses measurement systems, ensures the equivalence of lightning impulse test results which were carried out in different high-voltage laboratories. The purpose of these tests is to check the resistance of high-voltage equipment and devices to chop pulses, which simulate the high voltages and currents generated when lightning strikes a structure or an electrical distribution line.

Moreover, the importance of the accredited calibration of high-voltage capacitors, which are used in high-voltage power supplies, filtering systems and many other industrial and scientific applications that require storing, and releasing electrical energy at high voltage levels, lies in the fact that, as Pascual Simón, the director of the LCOE's High Voltage Technology and Metrology Centre (Centro Tecnológico de Alta Tensión y Metrología, CTAT), points out, these devices "are used in test laboratories as the main component of high-voltage measurement systems for alternating or impulse voltages (...). It is important to have accredited laboratories that are capable of calibrating the instruments used both in the laboratory and in the field for these diagnoses, mainly measuring bridges and high-voltage standard capacitors".

 

Accredited services: an added value for the energy sector

Thanks to these new accredited services, says the director of the LCOE's CTAT, the market will be able to "have safer and more reliable electricity networks, so that a sufficiently long use-life is guaranteed to recover investments, incipient faults in insulation are detected and accidents and service interruptions due to faults in the networks through techniques to diagnose their condition are avoided”.

“We are convinced, says Pascual Simón, that ENAC accreditation is the best tool to ensure all the agents involved in the electricity sector, the high voltage measuring equipment used for inspections or tests works properly, and that they are capable of providing the necessary measurement uncertainty according to the test to be carried out. Both for testing and trials of high-voltage equipment and apparatus before they are put into service, and for assessing the insulation state and its ageing once the equipment has been installed”.