EMAES Experience in the substitution of

the Regulation Systems of the Underground

Power Plant, Henry Borden
Ana Tereza A. Marques Alonso Tomazelli; lvaro Martins; Carlos Alberto Rodrigues da Silva; Edval
Delboni; Jos Alberto da Silva Matos; Mrcio Galdino Dvila; Jos Roberto Muriano; Mauro
Antonio Pinto; - EMAE Empresa Metropolitana de guas e Energia.

Abstract- The aim of this paper is to present Henry Bordens
regulation systems modernization. This power plant is located in
Cubato, So Paulo, and the company responsible for it is EMAE
Empresa Metropolitana de guas e Energia S/A..
The modernization consisted in the total substitution of the
regulation systems, which include the installation of digital
electronic governors and potential regulation, indirect static
excitation and auxiliary system of 125 Vcc.
The aim of this project is:
New composition of the security and operation liability
conditions of the regulation system of the power plant;
Extension of usefulness with lower costs;
Faster answering time;
Decrease of the maintenance costs;
Improvement of operational performance especially during the
instability occurrences in the system.

Index Terms-- Modernization, Velocity Governors, Tension
Regulation, Indirect static excitation.
I. NOMENCLATURE
HMI: Human-Machine Interface;
HPU: Hydraulic Pressure Unit;
PRT: Voltage Regulation System;
PRV: Velocity Governors System;
PLC: Programmer Logic Control;
MLDTs: Magneto strictive Linear Displacement
Transducer
II. INTRODUCTION
T
HE aim of this project is to present Henry Bordens
regulation systems modernization. This power plant is
located in Cubato, So Paulo, and the company responsible
for it is EMAE Empresa Metropolitana de guas e Energia
S/A.
Henry Borden Underground Power Plant was built back in
1950, located inside the massif of Serra do Mar Mountain and
is responsible for the generation of 420 MW, which are
produced by six (06) units composed by Pelton Turbines with
head of 720m.
The modernization consisted in the total substitution of the
regulation systems, which include the installation of digital
electronic governors and potential regulation, indirect static
excitation and auxiliary system of 125 Vcc.
III. HISTORY
In 1889, a law signed by President Campos Salles allowed
Light and Power Company Limited to be operational in
Brazil.
After building many small power plants there was the
necessity of enlarging the generation park, mainly because of
the fast industrial growth of So Paulo city and thus of the
demand for electricity.
So in 1926 the first generation unit of Henry Borden started
operating.
Its importance lies in its strategical position because it is
located in the South, Southeast and Center-West system,
which is the most important economical area of the country
and near the shipping center of So Paulo. Nowadays, it is
also important for the electrical system in situations of low
stability of the system black out.
Its hydraulic and generation systems contain reservoir,
channels, power plants and associate structures which aim:
- To administrate the operation concerned about the
rational and multiple uses of water and hydraulic resources
available, promoting the generation of energy disposed in load
centers;
- To control the floods in So Paulos regions;
- The distribution of water for public supply;
- To preserve the environment. Nowadays, its generation
park lies inside the city of So Paulo along with the
preservation area of Mata Atlntica forest, surrounded by
people in its reservoir and pollution waters.

This work was supported by EMAE Empresa Metropolitana de guas e
Energia So Paulo.
The author of this paper is:
The EMAEs hydraulic complex, Henry Borden, was until
A.T.A. M. A. Tomazelli (e-mail:ana.tomazelli@emae.sp.gov.br)

Paper accepted for presentation at 2003 IEEE Bologna Power Tech Conference, June 23th-26th, Bologna, Italy
0-7803-7967-5/03/$17.00 2003 IEEE

the early 60s the biggest generation pole of Latin America.
Henry Borden is constituted by two high head power
plants, with a flow of 157 m
3
/s and hydraulic center of 889
MW. The first is formed by 8 generation units with the total
capacity of 469 MW. Each unit contains two horizontal Pelton
turbines with the generator in its center, connected by a
penstock, called Usina Henry Borden Externa.
The other one, named Henry Borden Subterrnea
(Underground power plant), contains 6 generation units (11 to
16) inside a cave of 120 m of extension, width of 21 m and 39
m high. This plant has 6 generation units constituted by
vertical Pelton Turbines, each one with the total capacity of
420 MW.
Henry Borden Externas first generation group started
operating in 1926 and Henry Borden Subterrnea in 1956.
IV. FORMER VELOCITY GOVERNORS AND VOLTAGE
REGULATION DESCRIPTION
A. VELOCITY GOVERNORS
The velocity governors were mechanical/hydraulic kind in
the old conception, with answering time relatively slow,
which led to deficiency when in operation, because the load
and frequency systems need fast answering time. They were at
the end of their usefulness what caused bad efficiency to the
Henry Borden Power Plant.
Hydraulic pressure unit, valves, and air/oil accumulators,
manually controlled, working at pressure between 20 to 30
Kgf/cm
2
formed them. Basically, the servomotors of needles
11 to 14 were of simple effect, while the 15 and 16 ones were
of double effect, part of them placed inside the water stream,
and part inside the adjacent rocks.
The units 11 to 14 had Woodward velocity governors, and
the units 15 and 16 Charmilles governors.
The operation of the 6 units started between 03/1956 and
06/1961.

B. VOLTAGE REGULATION
The excitation system of the generation units had GFA - 4
Voltage Regulators made by General Electric.
These systems were composed by pilot rotary exciters,
motor controlled resistance and main rotary exciters.
The voltage regulator led the motor controlled resistance to
small voltage variations. These variations changed the
machines excitation, in order to satisfy the needs of the
electric system.
Under system variations, that demand fast and significant
variation of excitation current, the voltage regulator ordered
contacts that provided resistance to the main excitation fields
circuit or enabled it according to the machines need of
excitation or not.

C. FORMER GOVERNORS MAIN PROBLEMS
The governors main problems were:
- Consuming of some components, caused by the time of
operation;
- Difficulty to obtain new spare parts, because there were
not any of them in the country;
- Difficulty in the field calibration;
- Inefficient pumping to replace oil in the reservoir;
- Oil contamination caused by the water, because of the bad
seal of the servomotor;
- Low operational flexibility because the regulation worked
only on the four (4) injectors at the same time;
- Setting limitations to obtain damping and adequate
response velocity .
NOTE: each unit had its own governors.
V. DESCRIPTION OF THE NEW REGULATION TERMS
The process of modernization and automation of Henry
Borden Subterrrena (Underground) started in September of
1998, trough the new Velocity Governors System, Indirect
Static Excitation, Voltage Regulating Control, Digital
Synchronism and auxiliary system of 125 Vcc for the units 11
to 16.
These systems allowed the remote command and
supervision of Underground Henry Borden regulation trough
the control room of Henry Borden Externa, including the start,
stop, and synchronism of the generation units. The companies
responsible for the project were: GE-Global Controls Service
and Voith-Siemens Hydro.
The new systems started operating between November
1999 and June 2001.
The Underground Power Plant is not fully automated yet,
because the start conditions are still made by the operator,
step-by-step. After that, trough a single command, the unit can
start and synchronize to the system. The load necessary to the
system is given by the operator trough a command in the HMI
(Human-Machine Interface) installed in the velocity regulator
panel.
Moreover, another HMI was also installed at Henry Borden
center control room (approximately 1500m of distance),
permitting the start and stop of the machines in a remote way,
through optical cable communication (MODBUS). Besides
the start and stop of the generation units in an automatic way,
the new system allows the synchronism semi automatic,
automatic and manual.
The new systems permit two operation ways: local and
remote. The selection is made by a command key inside the
velocity governors panel (PRV).
The signals controlled by PRT are sent to the velocity
governors through a hardware using analogical signals of 4 to
20 mA. For each machine the following items are controlled:
- position of each needle;
- position of the deflector;
- opening limit;
- velocity;
- frequency;
- voltage (equalized value)
- reactive power;

- active power;
- excitement error;
- velocity governor error;
- to lower or to higher the velocity / frequency reference;
- to lower or to higher the voltage reference;
- generators field voltage;
- generators field current;
- maximum and minimum field current;
- stator current;
- position of the breaks;
In the Henry Borden Externa, traditional power plant, the
following screens for command, control and supervision of
the regulation systems were introduced:
- 1 screen with general summary of 6 units;
- 1 screen per unit, Turbine;
- 1 screen per unit, Generator;
- 1 screen per unit, Hydraulic pressure unit ( HPU);
- 1 general screen for alarms.
-
A. GOVERNORS OF VELOCITY
The regulation program assures that all the needles and
deflectors provide virtual feedback in an independent way
under any kinds of disturbs. Each element contains its own
PID, along with associate obtaining. This kind of control
allows the operation of the turbine combining needles in
couples in order to optimize the generator efficiency.
During the start in low power levels, only two (2) needles
are used. As the power generated raises, the other couple of
needles begin to operate. In order to avoid that these
transactions cause disturbs in the power generated, the
regulator controls the total water flow trough the turbine,
without concerning about the individual position of each
needle.
The system also allows two (2) ways of operation:
1) Flow control: In this case, the set point used is the flow
one, so no conversion is necessary.
2) Power control: In this case is used the curve Flow X
Power to convert the power values into flow values.
The governor regulations system of the 6 units uses
Woodwards PLC (MICRONET) which was integrated
(attached) by General Electric Global Controls Services.
The governor is composed by the following:
- Main controller, Micronet TMR (Triple Modular
Redundant) equipment;
- Digital Synchronizer and Load Control (DSLC) for
automatic synchronization;
- Protech 203, used as velocity protection equipment.
- The electro hydraulic interface - EHI is composed by
proportional valves, which activate the needles. For the
deflectors it was used a 2-stage distribution valve. In this
valve it is included an emergency stop valve, manually
operated, a solenoid valve for emergency stop and a
pattern building block. All these pieces are put together in
the hydraulic pressure central.
In this system the electronic feeding of the needles position
is made using linear transducers named MLDTs Magneto
strictive Linear Displacement Transducer, installed in each
servomotor (1 for the deflector and 4 for the needles).
The hydraulic pressure unit, the pneumatic brakes of the
generator and the hydraulic breaks of the turbine are also
controlled by the MICRONET.
The HMIs for local command are installed at the door of
the governor panel, which were produced by GE FANUC,
touch screen, and are connected by serial cable RS 232 to the
Micronet.
The individual control of each unit is linked in a MODBUS
protocol net. The remote HMI, constituted by a
microprocessor computer, IBM PC kind, with a LCD monitor
is also connected to this net. It was used the supervisor
software INTELLUTION FIX 32, with 2000 points for
supervision, installed at the control room of Henry Borden
Externa Power Plant.
The communication between the controllers net and the PC
was made using a optical fiber cable.

B. VOLTAGE REGULATION AND INDIRECT STATIC
EXCITATION SYSTEMS
The Voltage Regulating and Indirect Static Excitation
Systems are digital electronic and are formed by:
1 Metal Control panel containing:
- Control SIMADYN D using thyristor converter SITOR.
The connection between the SIMADYN D and the SITOR
is executed by cylindrical shielded cable of 50 wires.
- HMI named OP2, for visualization of the parameters of the
Generator and of the Voltage Regulator, alarm messages
and entry of commands and measures in test.
- Protection Relay of the Generator: F040 (ANSI 40
Excitement loss relay), F059 (ANSI 59 over-voltage
relay) e F064 (ANSI 64 ground fail relay).
- Exchanging switch with extractable knob (S001) of Local-
Remote commands.
2 - Excitation Transformer
The Excitation Transformer, which is placed in the
excitation transformers box.
The Excitation System takes from the Synchronous
machines terminals the necessary energy requested for the
excitation.
The schematic diagram below shows the beginning of basic
operation of the station excitation system in the power part,
where the indirect excitation system was adopted:



Scheme 1 Indirect Excitation System

The control of the generated voltage is made by acting on
the winding field of the brushless excitation producer.
In order to start up the excitation, is used 250 Vdc system.
Accomplishments of the SIMADYND controller:
- The voltage regulation;
- Generation of shoot pulses by the thyristors;
- Generation of set points of the terminal voltage and the
excitation current;
- The stop and the supervision of the excitation system.
The excitation system and the voltage regulation have local
automatism through dedicates commands and control digital
systems.
Constituted by the automatic Commutation system
follow up, witch in case of failure of the automatic voltage
control channel, allows in an independent and non-stop way,
the transference to the manual control channel , keeping the
supervision of the systems.
They posses a special software Struck for the systems,
which interface and communication software, with open
protocol.
They also posses automatic failure detection systems and
processing, which make possible repairs without stopping the
equipment.
The communication doors are RS-232 and RS-485, with
standardized local nets.
These new regulation systems introduced the following
improvements:
- Fast response of excitation in face of the load variations.
- Sensibility and adjust in case of transients and sudden
voltage elevations.
- Fast response in case of load loss.
- Stable acting during normal operation.
- Ability of adjusting the system voltage level.
VI. RELEVANT ASPECTS OF THE PROJECT
The construction of the power plant happened between the
20s to 50s, and today it works in apparently satisfactory
conditions. Nevertheless the machines and the electro-
mechanic systems needed intervention from time to time
because of the lack of spare parts and because there was no
similar national equipment for the substitution of several
components, and therefore the progressive obsolescence of the
former system.
Hydraulic constructions with identical equipment capacity
would mean big investments.
The modernization of the Henry Borden Underground
Power Plant makes possible the innovation of the trust
(security) operational and the extension of the useful life of it
with lower and possible investments.
The modernization, through the incorporation of command,
control, protection and supervision systems with digital
technology made possible bigger income, efficiency and the
reduction of operational costs.
The experience used substitution and modernization
technologies, which go through the following themes:
- Substitution of former velocity, mechanical governors by
new digital electronical ones;
- Substitution of the hydraulic pressure system by a high
pressure one, including new hydraulic units, distributor
valves of pattern control, sensors, and instruments
required;
- Possibility of connection between the hydraulic units, 2
by 2, aiming the increase of operational availability,
which means to promote the operation of two generation
units through the connected pressure system;
- Substitution of the needles and deflectors servomotors
for the new high pressure hydraulic system;
- Substitution of the existing air compressors by a Nitrogen
gas in bladder accumulators;
- Substitution of the mechanic system that indicates the
position of the needles by digital electronic control based
on linear position transducers MLDT, and the install of
velocity magnetic sensors (magnetic pick ups);
- Substitution of former analogical voltage regulators by
digital, electronic, multi processed ones;
- Substitution of the rotating pilot exciter by indirect static
excitation systems;
- Substitution of conventional command, control and
limiters by digital command, control and limiters including
the optional function PSS (Power System Stabilizer).
VII. EMAES EXPERIENCE

The implantation of the regulation systems at Underground
Henry Borden Power Plant, because of the challenges faced,
which promoted new acknowledgement and experience for
the company, such as the following:
- Definition and standardization of the most important
redundancies in the systems;
- The need of substitution and adaptation of the systems,
auxiliary control equipment;
- Difficulty in the adaptation of the new servomotors, due
to the physical limitations of the plant (without modifying
the injectors profiles);
- Relevant aspects related to the connection between the
hydraulic pressure units;
- Standardization of the components ;

- Interface executive project between the previous and the
present systems;
- Considerations about the install of the PSS (Power System
Stabilizer);
- Necessity of studying the coordination and selection of the
protection systems.
VIII. CONCLUSION
The new systems offer:
- Re-composition of the safety operation;
- Introduction of the Power Plant into the modern process of
operation and maintenance;
- Standardization of the governors, voltage regulators and
hydraulic pressure units;
- Standardization of the spare parts;
- Reduction of maintenance and operational cost;
- Improvement of the systems efficiency with the
diminution of the feedback time when it operates in the
electrical system, controlling the load and the frequency;
- Enlarging the usefulness life of the generation units with
lower cost;
- The possibility of remote operation of the generation
units.
IX. REFERENCES

[1] Technical Specification of EMAE - ET TGM 012/96.
[2] GE Global Controls Services Maintenance and Operation Manual;
Governors Systems.
[3] Voith Siemens Hydro - Maintenance and Operation Manual; Indirect
Static Excitation System and Tension Regulation.

X. BIOGRAPHY
Ana Tereza A. M. Alonso Tomazelli was born in
Santa Cruz do Rio Pardo, So Paulo, Brazil on June 20,
1954. She is mechanical engineer, graduated from the
Federal University of Itajub.
Her employment experience included the EMAE
Empresa Metropolitana de guas e Energia do Estado
de So Paulo. Her special fields of interest included
hydraulic equipment.
She is experienced in power plant automation and inspections of
hydraulics equipments. She has also participated of international inspections
of foundry and machining of equipment, conferencing about the subject on the
IAHR.