EMPOWERTRANS entered into a new technological arena, by executing the Transmission Line between the Power plant of India Power Corporation (Haldia) Ltd and the West Bengal State Electricity Transmission Company Ltd substation at Haldia in West Bengal, using a combination of new generation Monopole Towers and High Temperature Low Sag cables. This enabled it in acquiring an edge over traditional technologies, since this new technology “combo” seems to be the right step for the future in transmission lines, especially in India with the extreme congestion in large industrial hubs and the rapid rise in Right of Way (ROW) compensation costs one on the one hand, and the bigger sizes of Pooling substations catering to a much larger number of transmission lines converging through the same limited corridor space.

The monopole towers, besides being much slimmer and having a vastly smaller footprint, are very less susceptible to failure during severe wind storms, and can carry comparable loads but with the same longevity. Moreover, unlike conventional lattice type towers whose sheer number of pieces make inventory handling at project sites a near nightmare, in case of monopole towers the parts are much less, with easy traceability.

Monopole Towers in conjunction with High Capacity Low Sag (HCLS) conductors that have been used in the Haldia Transmission Line have provided high overall performance at the most optimum costs. The alloys used in these conductors can carry electrical power almost 2- 3 times more than conventional varieties, while being physically stronger than the former types.

With the additional feature of “low sag”, the towers could be spaced further apart, compared to those with conventional conductors. In fact, these conductors could carry up to twice the current of conventional conductors, which also resulted in 25 to 40 per cent lower line losses. The cost per MW of power transferred would work out at least 50% of that for conventional lines, even without considering the higher longevity of these lines.