Is SAS engineer, Protection,Communication or SCADA engineer?

[shalhoob109]

Hi everyone,

In my country we have alot of new projects(substations) that have SAS in their designs.
Like many others I was supprised who will extend his responsibilties to be SAS engineer.
SAS as you know is mostly communication(f.o) ,Industrial servers, and IED's (numerical relays)!
and the main objective is related to control and operation!.
My exact QUESTION, if any company(utility) will make a new division for SAS systems, what kind of
engineers are qualified to work perfectly in this system, Protection, Communication, SCADA , or Operation?

I appreciate your participation

regards,

Shalhoob

 

[rcw retired EE]

SAS =??? Substation Automation Systems? Scandinavian Air Service?

 

[shalhoob109]

in Electric Power & Transmission & Distribution Forum , SAS absolutely stands for substation automation.

 

[cuky2000]

Acronyms are not always universally known. SAS is not popular in the US and other part of the world.
Many utilities prefer assign the automation of substation to an electrical engineer with solid knowledge in protection and control.

I am not sure if a person with IT or just communication background.

 

[lz5pl]

Another version of the acronim: SAS = Special Air Service. Very respected unit !

Seriously speaking - from my experience on projects with Siemens and AREVA they have separate departments for SAS. Actually they have to coordinate their work with secondary connection designers on design stage and with protection engineers - on commissioning stage.
What I have seen is that these colleagues are more electrical than telecommunication engineers, but with very solid training in communication matters.
Total division between both specialities cannot be laid because with modern numerical relays and bay controllers both parts - SCADA engineers and relay protection engineers - have to configure and parametrize parts of same IED. So coordination bewteen them is the first priority for successful project.

For smaller companies like ours we decided to combine both parts in order to take complete project. This makes coordination problems much easier, but of course increases workload and in the same time makes profit levels less, as multi-qualified specialists must be better paid, but their specific knowledge cannot be fully used during the year. Anyway, it is matter of management decision.

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It may be like this in theory and practice, but in real life it is completely different.
The favourite sentence of my army sergeant

 

[dpc]

My $0.02 - Substation Automation probably most closely aligns with SCADA in terms of engineering skill set. It probably requires acquiring more understanding of the protective and control functions of the IEDs in the substation than the typical SCADA engineer will have.

Maybe it's a cultural/organizational thing, but I wouldn't think too many utilities in the US would worry about qualifications too much. They just assign somebody to do the job. Could be a protection engineer, SCADA tech, or whatever. Capability and attitude make more difference than specific credentials.

David Castor

http://www.cvoes.com

 

[slavag]

SAS is more ABB's naming ( SCS, SMS- C control, M-manegment )
SCADA is only part of SA or SAS.
SA is included bay oriented level and station oriented level.
Load Shedding is part of SAS, BF is part of SA.