With our knowledge of critical power, cooling solutions, infrastructure and power monitoring and our technical understanding of building standards for the data centre industry, we are best placed to deliver on refurbishment or new build projects, providing true turnkey options; on walls, floors, ceilings, sub-structure and super-structure. We use our expertise to provide the correct solutions with the optimum return on investment in mind at all times.
We have over 20 years of operation, gained a healthy respect from our peers, customers and suppliers of delivering engineering services to a broad spectrum of industries, institutions and authorities, including environmental engineering, offsite manufacture, rail, IT and facilities services.
Our focus is led by the drive to keep costs down and quality up, which are key requirements to our customers and why they engage with us early in the project concept allowing our design and technical employees to use innovative techniques that normal procurement routes exclude. We understand that IT infrastructure is critical to every business, especially when it is your business and therefore design and build systems, that have dual redundancies, as well as investing heavily in temporary and mobile equipment.
Finally, we believe that to continue to grow the relationship with our customers, it should always be with integrity, being part of their team, and at the heart of their business.
At this particular location, the site’s power distribution system had reached its absolute maximum Agreed Supply Capacity (ASC) from the local Distribution Network Operators (DNO) thereby preventing any further growth on the existing site footprint.
This particular site also plays a significant role in their overall strategy, a “core backbone” site, whereby further planned growth is destined and envisaged for many years to come.
To allow the increase of the ASC and ultimately upgrading the site to Tier 3 classification, the primary electrical infrastructure needed to be significantly modernised. This together with a catastrophic failure of the site’s back up generating plant, became the catalyst for the customer to instigate this project.
The new project to upgrade the generators and the site power distribution systems has gone extremely well. FEL Group have progressed well and everything has been completed as per our required standards and to the correct specification. The meters were installed, and final testing was carried out. FEL Group have officially handed the site back with the new generators running and live on our network.
Project
Major electrical project
Client
International television & telecommunications company
Location
Northampton
Duration
28 weeks
Tier 3 classification also required concurrent maintainability and “no break” on load testing of the generating plant, utilising G59 short term paralleling controls.
The upgrade of the distribution system began with the installation of a new 11kV substation, from which a client’s HV supply was installed to supply a new 11kV extendable switchboard. The new switchboard in turn supplies 2 new 2000kVA air cooled transformers arranged in N+1 configuration. The final connection to the main LV switchboard was provided by a cast resin bus bar system.
In the event of mains supply failure to the site, support is provided by 2no. 1250kVA diesel generators, with the additional facility for a third set to be installed to enable further site expansion. The diesel generating plant are configured with a paralleling control system to allow the generating plant to be either tested or taken off line for regular maintenance, without any disruption in the power to the site. A facility is also incorporated within the distribution system to connect load banks for generator testing and connection of temporary generators should they need to be taken out of service for an extended period.
Prior to commencing on any significant projects and as part of our due diligence, we carry out a ground radar survey of the whole site. This helps us to identify and locate any buried services and potential issues; on this particular project, this process revealed the presence of a considerable number of relatively shallow, previously unknown, surface and foul drainage services.
After consultation with our structural engineers and project team, our options were considered. We concluded that the proposed location of the generators would exert high levels of ground pressure on the drainage services, which would potentially result in failures at a later date.
Given that these drainage services would be inaccessible post the installation of the generators and associated fuel tanks, any access to carry out any repairs would be extremely difficult. To significantly reduce this risk, we elected to install a number of mini-piles, we then connected and linked the same with pile cappings.
Finally, we supported all the above with ground galvanised steel grillage, upon which both the generators and fuel tanks were situated.
The crucial result being that all the generator weight was bridged over, rather than on top of the drains.
Midway through the project, our customer revised the original design brief and requested that we incorporate automatic controls to assist in the isolation of the generator switchboard and main LV switchboard.
This resulted in the incorporation of an N+1 PLC’s control system, which automatically controls both the opening and closing of designated circuit breakers to ensure seamless support to essential services.
Throughout this project as a whole and despite the unforeseen challenges faced, FEL Group were pleased to ensure there was NO delay to the agreed programme
