Siemens’ STCL achieves milestone
in New Zealand
Siemens joins Transpower’s transformer suppliers
siemens.com/energy/transformers
Until now, Siemens has supplied Brazilian-, Austrian-,
and German-made transformers in New Zealand. Now
the company has completed the lengthy process to
pre-qualify STCL, the company’s transformer factory in
Jinan, China, as a supplier. The factory joins Indonesia’s
PT CG Power Systems and Hyundai on the three-strong
panel of suppliers.
Transpower New Zealand Limited, the state-owned
enterprise responsible for electric power transmission in
New Zealand, is carrying out a significant transformer
replacement program. »Being pre-qualified and included
as a panel contract supplier means we can now be
involved in that program with our Chinese-made
transformers,« explains Siemens New Zealand chief
executive Paul Ravlich. »You don’t get pre-qualified lightly.
The bar is set very high,« he says, and points out that the
process was a stringent examination of quality, service,
and health and safety factors both at the Jinan factory
and in the company’s New Zealand operations.
Siemens has already installed Chinese-made transformers
at Transpower sites at Stratford, Kaiwharawhara, and
Invercargill. The company’s performance in those three
projects was an important part of gaining approval as a
supplier, Ravlich says.
According to Transpower, the existing transformer fleet
includes models from 57 different suppliers. The national
grid operator moved to a supplier panel for transformers
to reduce the diversity of models on its system and the
associated cost, and says the panel contract arrangement
puts a strong focus on capital efficiency, standardization,
and continuous improvement. The company will work to
June 11, 2014 – signing ceremony at Transpower.
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build close relationships with the factories, which will
include witnessing factory acceptance tests and attending
manufacturing inspections and design review meetings.
The first supplier approved under the panel arrangement
in October 2012 was PT CG Power Systems from
Indonesia. Hyundai was included from May 2013.
In an overview document issued in November 2013,
Transpower said it had 352 power transformer banks on
the system, about 11 percent of which were due for
replacement. The average age of the 132 banks of singlephase transformers was 51 years, while the 211 threephase transformers had an average age of 20 years.
Transpower is expecting to invest about NZD 106 million
on AC transformer repairs and replacements during the
next five-year regulatory period starting in 2015. Planning
includes the commissioning of 30 three-phase transformer
banks at 15 sites to replace ageing and higher-risk units,
mostly single-phase banks.
Transpower says about three-quarters of the forced and
fault transformer outages since 2006 originated in
transformers acquired before new specifications and
procurement standards were established in 1992. It says
preventive maintenance and repair costs of modern threephase transformer banks are less than half those of the
older, single-phase banks and three-phase transformers
built during the 1970s and 1980s.
Siemens AG
Energy Sector
Power Transmission Division
Transformators
Martin Stoessl
martin.stoessl@siemens.com
Publisher and copyright 2014:
Siemens AG
Energy Sector
Freyeslebenstrasse 1
91058 Erlangen, Germany
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