High voltage takes center stage in this season of Hitachi Energy's Power Pulse podcast. We promise to bring you great content from the brightest minds in the business. We'll discuss challenges, opportunities, and all the hot topics any high voltage enthusiast or anyone interested in sustainability for that matter, is sure to enjoy. In this episode of podcast, we'll discuss the role of service as an offering.
We have an installed base of equipment in our power grid, which needs to be looked after if it is to have improved longevity and performance. To tell you about it, we invited Sofia Sauvageot to join us. Sofia is the head of High Voltage Products Service at Hitachi Energy, and will tell you about the different solutions available to optimize performance of existing equipment and meet the changing needs of every business and the industry as a whole.
Sofia is a trained materials engineer and studied across a number of countries like Sweden, Spain and France. She has been working in this industry for over 20 years. Welcome back to Power Pulse. I'm your host, Sam Dash, and today I'm speaking with Sofia Sauvageot, head of the global product group at High Voltage Service. Hi, Sofia. Hello. Thank you. You're very welcome. In doing my research about you, I learned you have a few horses. Is that right? Yes. I have a tendency to collect them.
It's probably one of the largest things you can collect. Well, there are bigger cars. I'm told also that you have a particular skill in naming horses as well. Did I hear right? One of them is Risotto and another is Trompeta. Yes, but it's actually not me, because this is also the tradition with the horses. So the Risotto, he is born the year of the r’s So then all horses needs to be named with an ‘r’. So his breeder then found the name Risotto for him, which suits him very well.
It's a very independent pony that does what he wants. And Trompeta, she is a Lippizaner horse. And that is very particular because it's one of the oldest breeds since more than 300 years, and it's managed by the military. So it's a system where if the mother is named Trompeta, the foal is named Trompeta, if it's a mare, right. And if it is a combination – that it is a male horse, then it takes the name of the father and the mother, and it's the combined name. And you add numbers to that.
So Trompeta is actually Trompeta 36. And then you add on an increment like this. Right. So this is how it works. As the lineage continues. We call her Tara. I would love to see some images of this horse farm. It I'm sure it's bucolic. Yes. You can follow that on Instagram or on internet. So high voltage by day and horses by night. Yes. Makes sense to me that you would have that balance in your life.
Something that's very hands on and very sensorial, and then something more heady, like the work you do at High Voltage. So let's actually jump into your role at High Voltage. What is service within High Voltage? So service in high voltage is a lot of things. But I think first of all is to be close to the customers and listen to their needs, but also to guide the customer to what they need for the future.
And today with the energy transition, we need the existing installed base to continue to live for much longer than it was initially planned. So this is really where service kicks in, how we can prolong the life cycle of our equipment, but also decarbonize and help the customers to move forward. Right. In this service sector, your area of expertise, how do you as a team, ensure effective communication and the passing on of knowledge?
What are the key qualities you look for in members of your department? So first of all, you need to be curious. You want to go beyond and push the boundaries because service is also about that. The classic image is the, that the person who can fix anything by himself – the MacGyver series in the 80s. So this kind of image. But that has evolved today. You need also to be savvy with technology.
That means you need to be able to use all the modern tools, including artificial intelligence, that we hope to implement shortly. But this is the mix of the old understanding and still be projecting on the latest technologies. And that's why to keep this knowhow is really crucial not only for us, but also for our customers, because when you sit on assets, that becomes 40, 60 or 80 years old, you have to have several generations working on the same products.
That's why we are investing heavily in our training centers, where we can train the customers as our internal people on all our products, including the old legacy products. Right. And so what does that training look like? So it is a mix between, today virtual training, of course, which is online, and e-learning, as well as a lot of hands on trainings on the actual modules of high voltage that we have then present in our training centers.
And this is then with classroom trainings and practical trainings in sort of the workshop area of the training center. So it's really this combination. And we have a former certification and also then recycling so that people keep the knowhow up to date with the latest evolutions because we also upgrade equipments so then people need to learn how to implement the upgrades. So this is continuous learning – is really key in service.
Yeah, I can imagine you really look for people who can be quite flexible in their ability to navigate how often the technology is upgraded, essentially. Is that right? Yes. And also, we should not forget that our field service engineers are highly skilled engineers. Some are also PhD. So this is a highly skilled workforce that I would say have a great capability also to take decisions on site.
And many of those that are the most skilled, they become trainers themselves in our training centers at the end of their career. And so they continue on that sort of body of knowledge and training. Yeah. Now, could you give us a basic understanding of warranty for relatable consumer products such as mobile phones, gaming consoles, cameras, cars, or even an air fryer, which is a very popular device these days? I would say the warranty is always warranty.
The customer expect also service and resolutions if something doesn't work. So that doesn't change whether we are in the consumer business or with the high voltage business. The implications, however, is much bigger. If your air fryer doesn't work, it's you and your family who get hit or your friends. If you're having a party and inviting people for dinner, that it doesn't work. So the impact is less.
However, the impact of a substation not working, not providing electricity to critical infrastructure such as hospitals, schools or military infrastructure or the city lights that immediately hits the primary consumer, all the people, which is then also the reputation of the utility customers.
So in both sites, you want an urgent solution because for you as a consumer, at that very moment, you're very upset when it doesn't work, whether it's your air fryer or the high voltage substation, except that the amplification of the two with the power station is so much bigger. So that's why we also want to learn from the consumer business, because they have put in place very clear customer service. You can call a number, you get support, you get the advice. You get fast solutions.
So this is also what we have implemented with the Customer Connect Service Centers, which is available 24/7 across the world, that speaks more than 14 languages across the globe. Right. And in that service, do you have to deal at all with issues of security and making sure that the right people are being serviced and getting the information they need to make sure things are running smoothly? Of course.
I mean, as we deal with utility customers, which are highly focused on safety, cyber security, some is also critical infrastructure, nuclear power plant, for example, or critical substations, you don't want people to know the exact locations, etc.. So there is a lot of information that is very confidential.
So that is also why we have gone through clear protocols, how to manage and who has access to what data, that we log into the case management systems that we use, where we log the information we get from the customer. So all this is very securely managed. That's reassuring. Now what are the different service portfolios.
So in terms of service portfolio, I mean we serve high voltage portfolio and high voltage is also a market where the customer really goes back to the manufacturer for the service, which means we do a lot from a clear basic maintenance, selling, spare parts, selling replacement when you need to replace an equipment, but then it of course where we need to innovate a lot. So that is also where we have innovated to do the, what we call the retrofit. We can replace the SF6 gas.
The global warming potential of this gas is very high. So sorry. Go back to what you were saying when you just introduced SF6 for me. Yeah. So SF6 is the name of a gas, it's part of a family called F-gases. So it's part of gases which can potentially have a very high global warming factor. So that impacts then the ozone layer that protects us all, which is then highly linked to the risk we have of the increase of the climate temperature in the world. Right.
So that is why it's very critical to replace this gas in current infrastructure. Yeah. And that is what our team has developed and implemented for what we call the gas insulated line. So it's long lines that is connecting different parts of the switchgear. So this is really crucial because we can then remove at least 50% to 80% of the gas in a substation, which is significant.
So digitalization of services presents more opportunities for a variety of customers to get access to reliable services around the globe. Can you give us some examples of these opportunities? Digitalization is a lot of things, and that is first of all, to structure your own information so you can actually connect the data between different tools and then cross-check data. And then we will learn much more and can advise much more of the customer what is actually going on.
And also to advise to the customer what equipment they actually have from us across the globe, as we have many customers that are operating in several countries, for example, then they can find synergies that they need to drive across their fleet. So that is the, I would say, the early beginning of the digitalization and how to connect data. Right.
Then you have, of course, how are we going to monitor and get data from the products out in the field, which is then by our, say, the instrumentation we put on and where we can read live data and do different analyzes and predict or advise the customer if the equipment is operating well or if there is an issue that needs to be looked at.
And so just on that note, I get the sense that these opportunities likely differ from country to country, and probably even within countries from region to region. Is that right? But the opportunities are all there. Then it is the maturity of, I would say, the customer and what is critical for them.
But that is also driven by itself of what is the financial mechanism in place in the country, because some countries they only get paid for electricity through the CapEx investments, and others also take into account the OpEx investment, how you invest in service. And so just to pause you there for a moment, I'd love to get some definitions of those terms for those of us who are sort of outside the industry. So you said those two different kinds of investments. What are those again?
So if you invest in capital, new substations, new transmission lines, this counts in certain countries as part of what you get paid for in the tariff, the utility by the government in place. And the government will not pay you to do a lifetime extension for 20 years for an existing substation, because that is not part of the model.
So this is part also where we want to team up and where also our customers wants to team up and prove that we actually need also to take this into account in the financial models that we should do the lifetime extensions, we should do the upgrades on the old equipment. So this is why you get different behaviors in different countries.
Also in terms of digitalization, because if you are in a country that privilege the operating cost to be part of the feeding tariff, the price for the electricity, then you also get a bit higher incentive to go for the digital solution to to enhance that, to improve your operational cost in a completely different way. Sure. That makes sense. And so I assume then that there are countries that you are maybe focused on trying to sort of bring up to speed
or get more investment in is that right? Yes. And this is why we have a discussions with the utilities across the globe on these topics. And actually today, I mean, Europe and North America has always been in advance, but now the speed is very high in the emerging countries in South Asia, Middle East and so on. And they are going to leapfrog in how they manage things. Oh, interesting. Yes. Yeah. And so how will that reverberate around the world?
This is what we try to project in our future vision to be ready, right. Because that's part of the big challenge, because you need to be several steps ahead of what can potentially be. And that is also, I would say, the advantage that we have local service centers across the globe to be close to the customer. So we we really see a huge demand now coming in the Middle East for more of these sustainable upgrades.
For the digital upgrades, there is also demand coming now in South Asia or in China, for example, that is highly interested. I think China has the most advanced version of the digital version of the equator in the world. And I assume with that comes certain dangers or precautions that you might need to interface with. Is that right? One of the true challenges is switch gear can have a lifetime of 40 years plus, which means it can operate for 40, 60, or even 80 years with lifetime extensions.
But the digital equipment, I mean, it's sufficient to look at your iPhone. Who has an iPhone that is five years old? Yeah, right. This goes for the same for the instrumentation. What you put in place as digital solutions. It requires so much continuous development that you have to think really future proof when you develop one concept, you already need to think, how am I going to develop an upgrade in the future to make a retrofit? Because it's not going to last 40 years. Right, right.
So this is part of, I think, the biggest challenge in this digitalization, the speed. Yeah. The speed at which things move. Yes. In development, but also in terms of on a micro level, the speed with which you need things to operate, the equipment to operate. Yes. And you also need the reliability because as one customer told me, we don't want to send field service engineers to the field because you have a sensor not working. It has to have the same reliability as the main equipment. Right.
In terms of talking through some more terms that I'd love to clarify with you, now that I have an expert at the table. Yes. Can you walk me through some of these terms I've heard floating around? What's the difference between a time based maintenance and a condition based maintenance? So the time based is the classic one, which says, like for your car every two years you need to go and get your oil changed. And it will remind you that it's every two years you need to go and get it changed.
The condition based is when it adjust in function of how you're driving. If you're driving a lot in the city with a cold car, etc., then today you will be asked to change your oil faster for a modern car, right? I see. So this is really what is the difference between the time based and the condition based.
And that is where I would say I've been long in this industry, but already when I was a young fresh engineer, we were in the in different conferences to look how to get to predictive maintenance because from this time based and that was then at roller bearings. So because it was rotating machines and how to get then to the vision of how you can project the bearing failures because that's a fatal failure.
That is really where it is not just about measuring equipment, it's about the algorithms that will help you to predict and how you see the trends going. And that is the tricky part, how you define the algorithm.
And that is what the whole industry has been struggling with, is define the algorithm, because you can have experts who look at the data and analyze and compare several sources, but it's not so easy to put it into an algorithm to get the automatic detection, so we can put in alarms and so on. And then to be able to predict, is it three years that remains, three months or three hours, I mean this is then the time span.
So this is really where I think we have the deep, deep knowledge in our company on our high voltage equipment, but also on the other equipment like transformers, to move from the time base to the predictive. And the digital part is really key to get to that phase. And you mentioned briefly a little bit earlier the growth in this idea of using AI to help with service. And maybe that's connected to what you're talking about with these algorithms.
Yeah, you can use AI there, but you can also use AI. I think the first utilization will be to help to troubleshoot, because if you ask a question I see this default. What are the potential root causes. Then it can go in and analyze tons of data for previous root cause analysis. Right. And then we can come up with much faster response. And I would say also more reliable, that we have looked at every stone and not just looked at the most recent cases, for example.
So is part of your work also compiling that data or those AI systems to use to help in that way. Yes. So that's why today we are not yet at the AI application use, but it's to structure the data and connect all the data system to create the backbone. So you can apply the AI on what we are having as data. Right, right. Now, we've heard how Hitachi Energy achieved this impressive feat in the area of replacing SF6 gas in an installed base.
Can you tell us a little bit more about that project from your perspective and what you've done in service? Yes. So here we we developed with a similar gas, but that doesn't have the same global warming factor – much, much, much less where we can replace the gas and still have the same dielectric properties, which is the key because the gas is actually an insulation. So you don't get the arcing. So this is the main purpose of why you have the gas. And remind me, that's EconiQ ? Yes.
This is the EconiQ. Exactly. Branding EconiQ means that we remove the SF6 gas and that is what retrofill is doing. We remove the SF6 gas by another gas mixture which is called C4FN. And with that gas mixture, we can guarantee that without any change to the actual equipment, we can just swap out the gas so it works with all the other components in place, like the ceilings, like the pressure and so on. So that this is why it is really an important feature.
We're learning how the energy landscape is so dynamic, especially with the large scale adoption of renewable energy resources and eco-efficient technologies. Can you tell us about some of the biggest challenges facing service providers and how they're overcoming those challenges?
Well, I think one challenge we have is we have very old equipment, which also have old materials that we need to continue or to find replacement for, because with the evolution of safety rules, but also which countries you can buy in due to geopolitical things, for example, there are a lot of things happening when we need to always to ensure we can get the old part.
So this is part also of where we do our judgment, what we should put on stock and what we should maintain and qualify new vendors or new materials to be able to to continue to drive. Right. in service. We are also looking how we can then from the supply chain point of view, also get material produced or renewable energies and so on. I mean, this is the future where everybody's going for and how we can optimize the transport in order to also be more eco-efficient.
We look at how we should deploy our service centers to be close to the customers, to to also be able to send people locally, because that is also how we limit the transport of people. Right. That makes sense. What do you see as the emerging technologies or trends that you believe will have a significant impact on the future of service?
I strongly believe that virtual reality will have a big impact because both in the learning phase, that you can then simulate or guide somebody to do things with the virtual reality. Yeah. But also on site to be able to guide people from distance, how to actually do it with a HoloLens and so on. We have already tested this, but at a smaller scale. I still believe this will get to a completely different level with future technologies.
I also think AI will be revolutionary in order to analyze much more data, much more unstructured data. This is really what I think is the gold mine for the future in service. Then I also think, I mean, in the end it is all about knowledge and training, how to enhance this further because we need to know the old products, we need to see how we enhance and how we can bring things forward in life.
Because I think with the sustainability obligations to maintain and extend the lifetime of existing equipment has a huge impact on the carbon footprint, because to melt new metal, to produce new metal, take new metals out of earth or– Dispose of the old ones. Yeah. And that is why for us, the other big leverage will be at the end of life. How can we repurpose or ensure this recycling of all the decommissioned products?
This is really including the gas, because this is also where we are looking into how can we recycle, including the gas, all the material. This is also part of the key how to develop this full end to end service. Right from producing the new product to the decommissioning and recycling of the old products.
And so in that work, do you find that you are faced with having to incentivize or inspire the clients or the customers to want to recycle or want to be invested in that life cycle that you just described? I really feel that we are exactly at the same wavelength with the customers. The customers we have engaged in those discussions, they have exactly the same questions. The question is, will they develop it? We develop it?
What makes the most sense in, you know, the players to take different parts in what needs to be done. But I think everybody is in alignment. What needs to be done. Then the question is also what will all this cost because it doesn't come for free, right? Who’s going to pay for it? Yes. So I mean in the end it's going to translate in the energy prices. Yeah. This has been really fantastic talking with you. Thanks for joining us today Sofia.
You've helped me understand how service plays a crucial role in infrastructure maintenance and optimization, all the while keeping pace with very quickly evolving dedication to sustainability. Thank you for tuning in to this episode of Power Pulse. Until next time. And that's it for today. We'll be back soon with some more great content. But before you go, remember to give us a follow so you don't miss an episode. Thanks for tuning in. See you soon!
This episode was brought to you by Hitachi Energy, created and introduced by Bárbara Freitas-Daniels. Content and script writing by Cassandra Inay. Guest speaker, Sofia Sauvageot. Hosted by Sam Dash. Produced and edited by Creative Chimps.