Powering ahead

Cutting-edge engineering consultancy, IPEC, is working with Chinese power companies to explore new business opportunities.

Power cuts are at best inconvenient, at worst costly and can be dangerous. A sudden loss of electricity supply can mean substantial loss of revenue for businesses, and can even endanger lives.  

Manchester-based engineering consultancy, Independent Power Engineering Consultants Limited (IPEC) has been working in the power industry since 1995. Since then it has developed a complete service for the design, manufacture and support of power engineering monitoring systems that allow power companies to anticipate and prevent power cuts.

“Our objective is to transfer cutting-edge technology to the power industry, by creating dialogue between academic research, industry and commerce,” says Patrick Fleming, Commercial Director of IPEC. “By working closely with our clients, we have been able to meet customer demands and develop commercially viable products which bring real monitoring and control solutions to the power industry.”

Cable monitoring

Typically, power is transmitted at very high voltage from power stations to substations in the city and then distributed at medium voltages. IPEC’s sophisticated technology monitors the underground cables that connect into the substations, checking them for signs that a fault may be imminent. IPEC then informs the energy company so that it can plan maintenance and avoid a power cut.   

The company has also developed Ultrasense, specialised equipment used in the manufacture of high voltage cable to give a consistent measure of its quality, alerting manufacturers to any flaws in the cable itself before it leaves the factory.

“We developed Ultrasense together with BICC plc, which was at the time the biggest cable company in the world,” says Fleming. “It was designed as a quality control for high voltage underground cables, which can carry as much as 500KV. But, this type of cable is no longer manufactured in the UK, so we have had to follow the market to the Middle East and the Far East.”

Practical help

With overseas expansion in mind, IPEC contacted UK Trade & Investment and was allocated an Investment Adviser who could help the company to make an export plan.

“We were already exporting to some extent, but UK Trade & Investment helped us to reach a new level,” says Fleming. “We joined the Passport to Export programme, which gave us four days of training, encouraging us to think structurally about our overseas strategy. UK Trade & Investment then helped to fund us to attend the WIRE 06 exhibition in Düsseldorf, and the Wire China exhibition, and also provided support in the form of translators and copies of our literature in Chinese.”  

New business

Wire China was a great success for IPEC. UK Trade & Investment had helped the company to identify the right power companies and technical experts to help them, and after the exhibition the company’s Managing Director Colin Smith and Senior Engineer Jing Zhao met with representatives from the Wan Ma Cable Company. As a result of their meeting, IPEC received an order last year for an Ultrasense monitor.  

IPEC has also been in talks with the Shanghai Municipal Electrical Power Company (SMEPC) about its cable condition monitoring equipment.

“Since a lot of the cable infrastructure in Shanghai was installed by British companies in the 1930s, 40s and 50s, it is now beginning to come to the end of its useful life,” says Fleming. “SMEPC has been looking for a way in which to monitor the infrastructure, so that it can prioritise the replacement of cables and sub-station equipment that is failing. We’re very proud to be a part of this process.”

IPEC plans to make the most of potential opportunities to work with Chinese power companies.

“We hope to develop a reputation in China that will encourage other power companies to use our systems,” says Fleming. “We are already talking with the Beijing Power Company and hope to meet with China Light & Power in Hong Kong in the next few weeks. It’s early days yet, but our export potential in the region is looking very promising.”