Improving the physical security and availability of substations by using new switchgear concepts

The innovations in the field of gas insulated switchgear (GIS) over the last year have brought up some new technical solutions like the highly integrated switchgear (HIS) which is leading to new applications in substations. The physical security and the availability has an increasing importance for today's substation solutions. Concepts based on air insulated switchgear and gas insulated switchgear are introduced to the market, and provide advantages in optimizing availability, safety and cost. Based on the HIS design, new applications in combination with infrastructures like office buildings, shopping malls or railway stations are possible. Solutions for future substations are not only related to the switchgear equipment, they are more and more complex system solutions, taking into account the equipment, environment and infrastructure synergies. In this paper these above mentioned aspects are explained and their impact is shown with examples.