Transpower is the owner and operator of the New Zealand's National Grid – the high voltage transmission network of lines and substations connecting areas of generation with towns and cities across the country. To 'keep the lights on 24 hours a day 7 days a week' Transpower needs to monitor substations closely, provide control, monitor operational data, and feed this data upstream to National SCADA.  

It was out with the old and in with the new recently for the HMI/SCADA at Transpower’s (TP) Islington Substation, one of their largest and most complex sites. The previous HMI system was at ‘end of life’, utilising an obsolete operating system & associated PC hardware, and posing an unacceptable risk of the loss of local control facilities at the substation. The requirement was for a replacement HMI system (both hardware & software) with almost 5000 points, communicating with the 53 C50 RTUs, used for control and indication functions as well as Reactive Power Control. Monitoring and control of the RTUs is carried out remotely from Transpower’s national SCADA and via the local HMI system.