Noriega, Ernesto
Empresa Electrica Matanzas
This paper presents a project to lower the outage rate and the repair cost of distribution transformer ownership to Empresa Eléctrica Matanzas (Electric Company of Matanzas). Matanzas province has the highest keraunic level in Cuba and besides it has a geological conformance very varied, so lightning is the most important cause of transformer failure every year. In an attempt to lower the outage rate and the repair costs, the lightning protection of these transformers was studied and a new lightning protection scheme was installed. The first section of this paper discusses the outage history in this province and existing transformer overvoltage protection. After, it is discussed in details all the stages of the project. The interruption data results one year after the protection changes and the project were implemented, are then presented. The results from the application of the project exhibit a significant improvement in the service reliability.
