Roxtec Cable Seals Help Combat Humidity & Leakage On Onshore Windfarms

By Chris Dodds on 13th December, 2013

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Roxtec cable seals have been selected to supply four onshore windfarm projects for Scottish Power Renewables (SPR).

Roxtec seals the cables in the cable trench that connects the windfarm array cables to the substation.

Graham O’Hare, Managing Director of Greater Manchester-based Roxtec UK, said the latest agreement reinforced Roxtec’s position as one of the key components in the wind-farm sector.

The deal will see the Swedish-owned company supply a wind-farm upgrade in Arecleoch, in South Ayrshire, Scotland. It will also supply three, new-build wind farms in Middleton, near Newton Mearns, Harestanes, near Moffat and Carland Cross, Cornwall.

“For Carland Cross, Arecleogh, and Middleton we are supplying our Roxtec H3 trefoil cable seals which are specialist substation seals.

They are meticulously designed to seal 150mm cable ducts and tested to be strong enough to carry the weight of the high voltage single core cables at the point they enter the substation – which transports power to the national grid,” says O’Hare.

He adds the effective sealing 33 kV substations was important to protect them from leakage and humidity. Humidity is a big issue in substations, and can be a disruptive and expensive problem.

The seals work by sealing several cables at one point of the substation wall. “This immediately reduces the risk of water leakage because by reducing the number of entry points required for the cables you also reduce the potential leak points,” he says.

Roxtec’s retrofit sealing solutions also cut costs for the operator by reducing the man hours required to manage the cables, he says. “The watertight substation seals provide plenty of spare capacity for upgrades.

The beauty of this is there is no need to cut more holes to install new cables which saves money in engineering time and prevents costly disruptions. Roxtec’s seals also cater for triplex formation power cables.”

Sealing Triplex Power Cables

Roxtec has developed the H3 150 Triplex cable duct seal, specifically to seal problematic high voltage triplex formation cables.

Traditional, mastic based sealants struggle to provide an effective seal for the triplex cables, not only due to the weight of the cabling, but also because the cables will usually bend upwards from the cable duct to their termination point at the base of the HV switchgear.

The Roxtec H3-150 helps to simplify the installation. As with Roxtec regular seals, it supports the heavy, inflexible cables and its three part design allows for easier installation.

As with standard seals, the Roxtec H3-150 uses Multidiameter technology. Each opening in the seal is fitted with removable layers, so each cable seal can be used for a range of cable sizes.

This design has been used effectively on the largest cables on offshore wind applications and is now being utilised on a number of regional DNO’s (district network operators) and renewable substations, as well as on a number of private networks.

Video: Sealing Trefoil Cables : Roxtec HV High Voltage Substation Cable Seals for Triplex Cables Using H3 Cable Seal 

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Roxtec Cable Sealing Transits - Wind Power

Category:  Cable Transits & Duct Sealing

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