The Government of Catalonia arranges independent third-party inspections for a number of power transmission lines to assure that operators are providing appropriate maintenance on a yearly basis. This year, SGS (http://www.sgs.com/_industrial) was awarded the contract to inspect 550 kilometers of electric power transmission lines through the mountains of Spain.
Inspections had to be carried out in accordance with local government regulations which include 29 visual checkpoints. On top of these statutory terms, the public tender required 7 additional visual checkpoints and a variety of measurements like contact resistance measurements, step and touch voltage measurement and thermographies.
SGS proved to have the knowledge and expertise to assure quality, cost effectiveness, safety and reliability throughout the inspection of the power lines operated by Endesa S.A. In addition to the ordinary inspections, SGS committed itself to document all pylons with photos, and archived them in a dedicated web tool. As well, daily reports were sent to the Government of Catalonia, detailing the progress of inspections.
“Now we have around 5,000 pictures of pylons and a website with all the field reports. It was not an easy mission for our teams as during the three winter months, we had to deal with rain, cold and snow in the mountains,” added Pere Camprubí i Baiges, project leader in SGS Spain.
SGS´s Electrical Installations Certification Services (http://www.sgs.com/electrical_installations_certification.htm) cover the complete life cycle of electrical equipment. In addition to the services during operation such as first-time and periodical inspections, SGS can help in verifying the design of electrical installations and in supervising the construction and installation phase. With the numerous accreditations SGS holds all over the world, we are able to identify conditions that could precede power failures and short circuits in electrical installations and facilities.
http://www.sgs.com/inspection-of-electric-transmission-lines-in-spain