Turkey's Largest Steel Producer Includes Intelligent Switchgear for New Cold Mill Steel Plant

Turkey has often been referred to as the "bridge between East and West" because of its geographic boundaries spanning two continents--Asia and Europe. Covering over 300 thousand square miles and having a population of over 61 million people, Turkey is one of the most industrialized countries in the Middle East. It's growing modernization and industrial growth make it an increasingly important player in the world economy. Although agriculture is by far the biggest economic contributor, one of the fastest growing industries is that of iron and steel. In 1994, Turkey exported over $1,719,000,000 in iron and steel products. Most of it was sold to Germany, Russia, and the United States.

Turkey's largest steel producer is Eregli Iron-Steel Works (also known as Erdemir) with gross annual sales surpassing $500,000,000. With the rising demand for Turkish steel, the company is on an aggressive path for increased modernization and expansion of its steel plants. Point in case is the recent decision to build a second, totally new, cold rolling mill located at Eregli, a small village on the Black Sea coast approximately 3.5 hours drive from Istanbul. The new mill will increase production from nearly 2 million metric tons of steel annually to 3 million metric tons.

 One of the key elements of the new investment is the plant's electrical distribution system. The specification sent out for bid consisted of 4 substations, including 80 cubicles at 13.8 kV and 22 at 2.4 kV. It also called for a local and remote monitoring and control system. Although not specifically stated in the specification, this part of the plan was expected by the Erdemir engineering department to be implemented with programmable logic controllers (PLCs), computers, and the usual forms of digital metering and relays.

Several manufacturers were sent copies of the specifications and were under serious consideration. These included AEG, ABB, GE, Siemens and Westinghouse. The existing switchgear of the older distribution system had been primarily supplied by GE and Westinghouse; and having experienced favorable performance from the American designs, the specifications for the expansion were modeled around them.

 Much has changed since the original distribution system was installed. Technology, particularly digital intelligence, has changed. Although most power engineering products are at such a mature level of development that little change has occurred, the electronics associated with these products has changed as often and profoundly as witnessed in the computer industry. This would, of course, affect the bid. The specifications were general enough to leave room for imagination and innovation.

Another less obvious change has been more gradual. It concerns the way we do business. It's global in nature. Certainly every bidder on the list is truly international. With our modern communications, it is not unusual for a bidding process to involve teams of personnel on all sides of the globe. Given the fact that the key components of the system are based on American designs, certainly the global aspects of our commerce provides the offices and representative companies located in Europe and Turkey easy access to their U.S. contacts. This too affects the bidding process.

In the final analysis, all of these factors would play a role as to whom all or portions of the project was awarded. Siemens AG, with a power equipment manufacturing facility right in Kartal, had a very strong presence. Certainly the prospects of dealing with a local manufacturing entity was seen as a distinct advantage. The facility, 76% owned by Siemens AG, is known as SIMKO.

SIMKO normally answers its switchgear bids throughout Europe and Asia with the Siemens AG equipment design and standards. These are slightly different than those of its Siemens Energy & Automation Raleigh, North Carolina facility. This is where the global aspects really play a key role. The SIMKO 8BK20 cubicles only go up to a maximum of 2500 amps without forced ventilation. The American designs (upon which the specs were drawn) call for 3000 amp equipment.

Given these factors, SIMKO's Sekür Uzbasaran contacted Ernie Sagar of Siemens International Business Development (IBD), Cranford, New Jersey, USA. Mr. Sagar recruited the assistance of K. S. Ramesh--an engineer at the Raleigh facility. He also involved the Atlanta, Georgia, USA, International Business Unit's (IBU) regional manager, Bill Evans.

At the Raleigh facility, a team of engineers and product managers were assigned the task of putting together the details of a proposal. One recommendation that immediately surfaced was the use of "intelligent switchgear" for the bid. Siemens' Intelligent Switchgear System (ISGS) is a digital solution for all the common protective relay functions, metering, indication and control associated with switchgear circuit breaker installations. The ISGS units are mounted in the doors of the switchgear cubicles. They use RS232 for local communication, but have an RS485 bus to provide plant-wide connectivity, including connectivity to supervisory level computers. This would have a distinct advantage over the traditional PLC solution. One obvious advantage is that ISGS is designed specifically for distribution systems, whereas PLCs require extensive programming and special hardware interfacing to fit a particular application. Of course, Siemens being the largest PLC supplier worldwide would have no problem providing a PLC solution if Erdemir preferred it. Even so, it was decided the proposal would recommend the ISGS.

Another key component of the ISGS proposal would be the Siemens WinPM software, a component of the Siemens ACCESS power monitoring and control system. WinPM software allows the user to configure field devices remotely over the communications bus. The configuration adjustments include detailed protective setups, such as voltage and amperage scaling. The user can also enter setpoints and define alarms. It would also provide a screen representation for the distribution portion of the cold mill . A screen representation could be configured that would mimic the distribution system with real-time data support.

With the final bid assembled, Evans and Ramesh traveled to Turkey to join Esref Tümer, Kerim Oal, and Murat Onuk of SIMKO in presenting the bid to Erdemir. Although received very positively, Erdemir had some major concerns regarding several issues. Total local support and involvement in the configuration was an absolute must. Also, the louvers for ventilation on the doors of the switchgear kept it from complying with the IP51 standards of the specifications.

 Later following the meeting Siemens and SIMKO regrouped and worked together to provide a favorable response to the Erdemir concerns. It was communicated to Erdemir that the switchgear would use the SIMKO 8BK20 cubicles as feeders and that SIMKO would manufacture transitions from the American designs to 8BK20 switchgear. Commissioning and support would be provided by SIMKO.

Regarding the louvers, it was decided that the 3000 amp specification and the need for a higher degree of ventilation for the cubicles would outweigh the need for strict adherence to IP51. In addition, after investigation, the electrical room was ventilated with positive pressure.

  When the final bid was presented by SIMKO, Erdemir awarded Siemens an order for 4 cubicles for the incomers of the system with 3 each of 3000 amp circuit breakers (2 incomers and a tie breaker) and 2 sets of PT's. They also purchased ISGS for each of the 3000 amp circuit breakers. Because they also wanted the WinPM system, Erdemir purchased an additional 78 ISGS relays for installation on the SIMKO AG 8BK20 cubicles.

No doubt that all parities agree that we could not have gotten this order without the teamwork from both sides of the globe. Technology is a very vital issue, but it alone cannot win orders just as price alone cannot. Global presence and worldwide support are very real components of many of today's bid proposals.

Bill Evans and Dave Glodowski both work in the International Business Unit, Siemens Energy & Automation, Inc.